Exploring St. John's, Newfoundland

 Hullo! Yes, we are in St. John's, Newfoundland!! At the far eastern end of Canada. From one coast to the other. We are actually closer to London now then we are to home. Go figure.

That's our hotel in the background. It's an old heritage building that used to process fish. Nothing fishy about it now!

It's beary conveniently located down by the harbour where we say this massive ship.

You can't quite get the scale of it. At first we thought it might be a fishing ship of some sort.

There's another one! We learned that these are massive supply/repair ships for the oil and gas industry off the coast. 

Alright, let's explore a bit of St. John's!

It is world famous for it's Jelly Bean Row houses. You might think there is only one "Jelly Bean Row" but... no... they are everywhere!!!

But first order of the day is breakfast...

We found this place... the Bagel Cafe, which looked good...

 And it has way more than bagels!!!

O.M.G. That is a generous breakfast!!!

Righto... all fueled up and time to explore...

Every corner has more Jelly Bean houses... except these ones are new apartment buildings. But they used colourful siding to make them fit the ambience better.

I'm sure the paint stores in town have no difficulty in selling brightly coloured paint!

And the Jelly Bean Houses sometimes have cute little mailboxes!!

Every colour in the rainbow... I think this town would be a great place for Jelly Beanie to visit!

Some houses have wooden siding that is painted, while others have colourful vinyl siding... probably easier maintenance!

Seriously... you can mix any two colours you want and make a super cute little house!

Are you getting tired of it yet??

These ones almost look like the Painted Ladies in San Francisco!

We had a bit of a break and walked through a park...

Where we found the rhododendrons in full bloom! And irises and lilacs... 

This place is like 2 months behind us! 

We can have two springs!! (Or early summers... or two allergy seasons...)

Mama has been hunting around and finally found the row of Jelly Bean houses she was looking for...

Why is this strip so important...??

Because she did a puzzle of this set of houses!!! The colours have changed a bit... but it's the same place...

And just around the corner we found a art deco building!!!

Oooohhh... it looks kind of like it belongs in Miami... especially with a name like South Beach...

 

 

 Beary fancy...

 

From all angles... 

 

And another pic of the front on another day with fewer cars in front... 

And then... of course... there are some bear sized jelly bean houses!!

And another art deco building... the blue one...

Plus this derelict beauty...

Beary nice...

Right... onwards... we wandered down towards the waterfront, past the war memorial...

And found a live band entertaining folks!

They were playing folk music... beary lively...

We got a great view of the harbour with Signal Hill in the distance...

St. John's Harbour is a brilliant harbour... it is beary deep (cruise ships come in here), with a narrow entrance (easily protected) and lots of rooms for staging ships. Makes sense that it was a major WW2 place!

And one more pic... so cute!!!

That evening... it was time to get Screeched... which involves eating a piece of bologne (but special NFLD stuff)... kissing the cod (a frozen one... ick) and...

... shooting back the Screech (which is just rum)...

The guy in the sou'wester was beary entertaining... and at the end everyone got a certificate saying they had been Screeched...

Iimpressive...

Mama says it wasn't half as bad as getting Hyderized, back in the day... which uses far more potent alcohol (Everclear)...

A Mystery Trip

 Hullo!! Today we are packing our bags and suitcases because we are going on a trip!

We had to get up ridiculously early...

And drive to the airport, where we left the car for a friend to come and get later... which means we are going to be gone for a while!

We got on the little plane and the sun wasn't even up yet!

But it was a lovely flight over the strait...

Once at Vancouver airport, the first order of business was breakfast. A little bear needs to be kept fueled otherwise things go sideways!

That's better! Now... any idea where we are going??

You will never guess...

We are on a big plane!! And got an emergency exit seat with more legroom!

And landed... where?? It's obviously a FIFA host city...

Now can you guess??

Yes!! It's Toronto!! But we aren't staying here...

We are just catching a connecting flight to our final destination. What with all the layovers, this will be a 14 hour trip...

We could have flown to London in less time... hmph!

We arrived in the pitch dark after midnight and caught a taxi to our hotel...

Sorry, this little bear is exhaustipated... time to sleep... more adventuring in the next post.