St. John's Newfoundland

I flew from Ottawa to St. John's on Sunday 8th July, arriving after 11 pm local time (Newfoundland is 1.5 hours ahead of Ottawa).
On Monday, 9 July, I walked along Water Street investigating the shops, and then up Signal Hill Road to the Johnson Geo Centre. This is a geological museum, appropriately carved out of the rocks of Signal Hill, built underground with exposed rock walls. The geology of Newfoundland and Labrador tells the story of the history of the earth, with the oldest rocks in the world (a team of geologists from the University of Tokyo has just found 4 billion year old rocks in the Torngat Mountains, older than the previous 3.8 billion year old rocks found at Gros Morne). What a fascinating museum.

The Geo Centre also included a gallery on oil and gas exploration off Newfoundland, named the Exxon Mobil gallery (Newfoundland's fortunes have risen with the Hibernia oil field, located 315 km east of St. John's), and a gallery on the Titanic story, described as not being about an iceberg so much as about the greed of the owner of White Star, the lack of training of the crew and the lack of lifeboats.

I walked back to the hotel by way of Commissariat House (1820); Government House (1831) home of the Lieutenant Governor, John Crosbie (the cod moratorium fisheries minister);  and the Anglican Cathedral (1847, designed by Sir George Gilbert Scott), where church ladies were serving much-needed tea in the crypt.

View of St John's harbour from Signal Hill

The R.V. Akademik Ioffe is moored between the red Coast Guard icebreaker and a tall ship.

On the front page of today's The Telegram (St. John's) was a story about the 7 July launch in Trinity Bay of a 44-foot, two masted schooner, built by 82-year-old Henry Vokey. Apparently small boats are now used for "hunting turrs" or a bit of cod fishing. Turrs are Common murres ("Guillemots" in Britain), members of the auk (Alcid) family.