Newfoundland 2011: One Big Dog

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We’re back and this is our story...

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Saturday 8/22. We don't usually over plan trips and this one was no exception. With one week to go there were just three small things to do before leaving...

Service the Jeep. Fix the transfer case shifter which suffered at my hands the last time it misbehaved, the fuel gauge which stopped working after a dip in a puddle and, finally, some bad drivetrain vibration which started sometime after not fitting between a rock and a tree the weekend before.

After some wrestling with rubber washers the transfer case shifter finally stayed put, with no rattling, and it even shifted. Then I replaced the chain and sprockets on my motorcycle, went rock climbing in New Hampshire and finally left for JFK airport 200 miles away in NYC where I was working all week.

Debbie wisely arranged for Bobby, our mechanic, to ready the Jeep in my stead. Its disturbing enough when you have your mechanic on speed dial but when your mechanic remembers your own phone number that's another thing entirely!

We drive a 2005 Jeep Wrangler Unlimited Rubicon Sahara. Feel free to arrange the same words in a different order if that makes more sense. For those who don’t speak Jeep, this is the two door long wheelbase model with locking differentials and is named after the Sahara movie and it is our second Wrangler. The first one, a 1997 model, is still going strong despite the efforts of two learner drivers and years of New England salt. Based on that experience we fully expected that the replacement would be just as reliable.

Readers of our 2010 report from Michigan may remember that we are no stranger to mechanical issues. That trip saw the premature death of several fuel pumps before a split hose in the fuel tank between the fuel pump and the sender unit was diagnosed as the cause. More recently we’ve paid a couple of big bills including a replacement gearbox just a couple of months ago. (The six speed manual transmission is a Mercedes unit and after a while it doesn’t like to go backwards.) On our part we do try to make sure that nothing fails because of anything we should have done.

Get maps. I've always liked maps, which I can pore over for hours while exploring in my head. I figured we'd be able to get detailed-enough paper maps en-route through mainland Canada. Not wanting to miss out on pre-trip exploring, I ordered Topo Canada on DVD and planned to spend some quality time with BaseCamp before leaving. This trip was a first for us, with an additional navigator in the form of a Garmin GPSMap 78S – our first GPS – which we hoped would settle disputes between the other two navigators. Would that be a wise decision? We shall see...

Wait out hurricane Irene. We had originally hoped to leave on Saturday but with storms approaching we decided our kids (one working, one at college) who live at home would probably disown us if we left for vacation with a tree sticking out the house! Fortunately the worst of the storm missed us and the house remained intact and the basement dry. For the most part our city neighborhood fared well although downed trees broke power lines and squashed at least one car. Fortunately nobody was hurt.

As I write this three weeks later our neighborhood is fine but the widespread devastation in Western Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire and other East coast states is going to take a long time to repair. Our best wishes go out to those folks.

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Monday 8/29. We left a powerless house behind and cruised through New Hampshire and Maine to Calais where we passed from the land of Dunkin Donuts to that of Tim Hortons. We had planned to stop in St. John, New Brunswick to stock up on food, book the ferry and maybe even surf the tidal rapids before pushing through to Nova Scotia. That was the plan. What happened was this: We broke down!



Back to the story: About 20 miles from St. John there was a sudden lurching and loss of power, shortly followed by the ominous “Check Gauges” light, loud ticking from up front then squealing. No go. A call to a friendly CAA dispatcher and equally friendly tow had us parked at the Chrysler dealer in town. Unfortunately the service department had just closed so we walked to the restaurant next door to eat – and cry in our beer – before retiring to the comfort of the roof-top-tent on the Jeep.

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Tuesday 8/30. For the first time ever we were first in line for auto service and after the chap who opened up got over his surprise he made us coffee and we waited. The TV in the waiting area was tuned to the Boston Channel 7 news station and we confirmed that over 160 thousand homes are without power (including ours), and we should count ourselves lucky. And we waited. We wondered why the Boston local news is on TV. And we waited.



While we were waiting a technician had plugged his computer into the Jeep and followed that with a long discussion with the Chrysler tech support crew. The diagnosis: the cam sensor is broken. What that really means: if its floating around the engine, the engine is broken. They won't know until they pull off the oil pan. Then some painful worst case dollar amounts were said.

It was made clear that we wouldn't be going anywhere under our own steam unless we found some different steam so we trotted down the road to a car rental place which didn't have any cars but hooked us up with a pickup truck which we filled with most of the junk in the Jeep.

The technician said that it looks like the oil pump broke. Our hearts sank.

We found the reversing falls opposite the pulp mill where at low tide there are some rapids with some large waves. I had hoped to find some local kayakers there but another day, maybe. Downstream the whirlpools looked huge from way up on the bridge.



Fortunately the junk in the Jeep included a small two person hike tent so we drove to the closish New River Beach Provincial Park which has a very pretty beach but the camp sites are sandwiched between that and the noisy highway.



We discussed our options and agreed that if the Jeep engine really did need to be replaced we weren't going to let it ruin our vacation. We would simply take the rental truck to Newfoundland and collect the Jeep on the way home. Then we cried into some more beer.

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Wednesday 8/31. Some luck at last! There were kayakers at the reversing falls and I joined them and surfed some big standing waves for a while until the rising tide flattened them out.



It seems that everybody in St. Johns speaks with an Irish accent and is a die hard Red Sox, NY Yankees, NY Mets or Dodgers (from when they were in Brooklyn) fan. No love for Toronto or even the late Montreal here!

For lunch, Tim Hortons served us nice sandwiches on real plates and also coffee, which was.... To be honest the coffee was a bit of a let down. I'm not a coffee snob by any means but I was rather hoping for some French influence. Even Dunkin Donuts, which I try to avoid, tastes stronger and nicer than this. In their defense, and to offend a third nation, both are superior to the undrinkable instant stuff the British mistakenly call coffee. I'm an Anglo-American double agent on vacation in Canada so maybe I should stick to tea? Debbie, on the other hand, is a full blooded American coffee snob and was almost inconsolable when she discovered that the cappuccino is the same undrinkable instant stuff gas stations serve at home. Tea for her, too!

We had been avoiding learning our fate for long enough and – after promising not to shoot the messenger – we learned that the oil pump had failed, the closest new engine was three days away and after the holiday weekend would take at least two days to install.

So with the expected but still heavy feeling in our stomachs we made one last trip to the broken Jeep to pull out the refrigerator. Which, in a quiet parking lot and after lots of trial and error, was secured in the back of the cab of the truck using some kayak roof rack straps and some leftover firewood from the previous night. Finally, about 48 hours after the GPS had originally suggested and in a completely different vehicle, the journey continued in the direction of Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia.



Some good news though: power was finally restored at home so kids could do all the important things like cook, bathe in hot water, watch TV, update their Facebook status, etc.

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Thursday 9/1. Another rather noisy night outside Baddeck, NS as the traffic for the 7 am Newfoundland ferry roared past our cosy beach at 4 am! Oh well, we'll be on our way soon enough. After breakfast watching the Englishtown cable ferry shuttling school buses we headed to North Sydney and the more sociable 11am ferry. Before boarding we chatted with the chap behind us in the line, a “Newfy” exile returning to his holiday home who said that most people living on the island were either too young to leave for better jobs or old enough to retire at their birthplace. We suspected that was an exaggeration but certainly speaks about the economy of the island.

The ferry was uneventful, calm seas but windy on deck and dropped us in Port Aux Basques the promised five hours and a half time zone after departure. The rugged, smooth and green but mostly treeless landscape was startlingly different from the mainland and reminded me of the Scottish highlands. All we needed were sheep...



A short drive to J. T. Cheeseman Provincial Park had us camped, fed and sat comfortably by a fire before the sun set. Finally, we were on vacation!

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Friday 9/2. Table Mountain rises 518m inland from the shore where we had camped and a narrow gravel road appeared to climb through a valley one side of it. Rental truck: game on! Steeper than it looked, low range was soon required and took us to a flat, barren ridge to two large antennas, the remains of old workings and great views of the surrounding valleys.




Trying not to think of broken engines

The lighthouse at Cape Anguile is the Westernmost point on the island and home to some sheep and where we ate lunch. Not sheep, but its hard to tell with pate sometimes.





A ways North on the Trans Canada Highway (TCH) took us to the Port au Port peninsula which was first settled by the French and contrasts Long Point – which is both and flat – and the sea cliffs at Cape St. George. The common factor was many small harbors full of lobster pots and boats.



We camped at the Parc Boutte du Cap where there was a sign saying something like “You're welcome to explore and camp here and we hope you see whales and Northern Gannets but please don't fall off the cliff and break it.” We did, did, didn't, didn't, didn’t and didn't, the sunset was nice and we really appreciated the positive attitude of the folks who run the park. They even provide a bread oven.




Name the flags!

[Adventure Jeep]

Cool write up and great the your troopers and didn't let a LITTLE thing like and engine rebuild stop your trip....

[grahamfitter]

Cool write up and great the your troopers and didn't let a LITTLE thing like and engine rebuild stop your trip....

Thanks for tagging along!