Transatlantic Cable History

 Hullo!! We have our picnic all packed and are ready to go! We bought the cooler at a thrift store when we got here... beary good idea!!

Oooh... stop the car!!! Is that a ratty iceberg???

They get icebergs here you know, although July is a bit late for them... but no... it's just a rock... Shag Rock (what is it with names here!!??).

We stopped at a cute little fishing village to stretch our legs and it's obviously an active fishing area...

There were cod carcasses all along the beach.

They obviously fillet the meat off and then toss the rest in the water for the crabs and lobster to nibble on.

And lobster there must be because there are tonnes of traps here!

We talked to some people who said that in the 6 week lobster season, a fisherman can make enough money to set them up for 2 years! Another person said a lobster or crab license was a license to print money!

6 weeks? And set up for 2 years? Must be nice!

I couldn't do it though... (a) don't like water (makes my fur go funny) and (b) get seasick (you have no idea what happens to a stuffie tummy on the open ocean).

There were some fishing boats here as well

And tables where they must gut and fillet their catch.

It's probably beary messy... also not a job for a little bear... (a) fish guts and fur do not mix and (b) knives and stuffie paws are not a good pairing!

Right... let's carry on!

We stopped here to do a little hike.

See... more of these bins!!!

It was a nice little hike along the headland. The trees here are beary windswept...

As are the stuffies!!!

It's a rugged coastline. We learned at one of our stops that the rocks in Newfoundland are beary beary old - like over 500 million years old!! One place, on the south coast of the Avalon Peninsula is called Mistaken Point and has the oldest fossils in the world - over 565 million years!

We aren't going there though... 

We are examining some more recent evidence of life... this is a little upside down sea urchin.

And a right-side-up one! It's beary pretty...

I don't think it would travel home well though... it would be sea urchin fragments by the time we go there!

There are lots of purple irises around. This one is probably the native Beach-head Iris (Iris hookeri *bear holds paw to head* seriously... who names these things??).

It's a gorgeous view out here and as we came around the corner we saw...

This little island with birds on it!! Are they puffins???

Nope... just your average run-of-the-mill... Seagull. Sigh.

But they do have puffins in Newfoundland!! And I am hoping to see some... on one of our stops.

It's nice to just sit and rest for a bit.

The trees here are very short and stunted... 

... even the ones behind me are not great shakes. They are probably super old but... not super big.

Right, let's head back. We have one more stop on this trail...

Oooh... more blueberry bushes... but we are too early. Sigh.

We found a gnome garden!!!

With a sign asking... what is your Gnome Name...

Let's see... first letter of my name is "S"... and month of birth is... November... so I am...

Twinkle Monkey Buns!!! Uh-huh... let's see who else I know...

Jerry would be...  Puddin Monkey Buns.
Ben would be...  Nipper Angel Pants.
Little Fox would be... Tinker Angel Pants or Sunny Angel Pants.
Beanie Mouse would be... Nipper Sparkley Toes or Dopey Sparkley Toes.

Fun!!! Onwards to our next location!

We drove up the coast to a place called Heart's Content... there are a lot of "Heart's" places here... Heart's Desire, Heart's Delight, Heart's Ease... to name just a few.

Anyhow... we are going into the Transatlantic Cable museum!

We learned about this massive ship - The Great Eastern - that was a failure as a cruise ship, but was big enough to lay the 1st transatlantic cable all the way from Heart's Content to Valentia Island, Ireland. That was in 1866 (a beary long time ago). PS. Great Eastern was designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel... the Victorian engineer/creator!!

That's a piece of cable there... with the beary thin copper at the very top, surrounded by different layers. It's like maybe 2 inches thick!

When this station shut down in 1965, they just left all the equipment inside and it eventually became a provincial museum.

You'd need to be an electrical engineer to understand all the ways in which they amped and decoded the signals!

There were more cables that went out from here too... down to Nova Scotia and the mainland. From there, signals could be passed along on regular telegraph lines.

This transatlantic cable changed communication - it used to take weeks for a message to get across the Atlantic on ships... but now... messages could be sent in mere seconds...

You'd have to know Morse code though...

deet deet...

I won't even try this out because stuffie paws are not meant for such fine detail!

One of the interesting things was that a lot of women worked in the cable station, particularly during the two world wars. It paid really well compared to fishing work!

Pretty cool!! And if you go outside...

There's a marker and...

You can see where the cable still is, inside that pipe!

Right... I'm hungry... let's have a picnic!

More veggies and hummus, eh... must talk to the catering crew of this little trip. Hmph.

We parked up at a lighthouse and there was this contraption... which is probably used for weddings.

It would be a nice view...

And yes... it is this windy up here!!!

There's the lighthouse!

Ooof... getting knocked askew by the wind!

Righto... signing off for today! On our next adventure, we meet some transportation heroes and heroines!