St. John’s Travel Guide | Things to Do, Coastal Views & Hidden Gems! RVing to Newfoundland Ep. 11.

It is like every postcard you've ever seen. It's really, really that quaint, that pretty, that beautiful. On this episode we head to St. John's, Newfoundland's historic and colourful capital. We'll explore St. John's jellybean row houses, the beautiful outports of Kitty Biddy, and the Battery and National Historic Sites at Signal Hill and Cape Spear. We'll even take another short ferry ride to nearby Bell Island and head underground to explore the number two iron ore mine. Here you can see all those large pillars of ore and where the ore is gone is an opening. We are Terry and Cindy O'Keefe. We've been camping together for more than 40 years and we invite you to join us on a 14-episode adventure as we explore Newfoundland and Labrador. Coming out at a 45 degree angle from the wind. Well it is a soggy, foggy and if possible even windier morning this morning. It's Happy Canada Day, July 1st. It's about 12 degrees right now in Bellevue Beach and we're packing up heading to St. John's where they've just issued a special weather statement calling for two to four inches of rain over the next three days. So the weather is still pretty unpredictable here in Newfoundland. You getting the water off me? Oh that's nice. All righty, here we go. Seems weird seeing all these buildings after a month of nothing but small little communities. We were headed for St. John's Municipal Campground, Pippi Park. Hi there. We're a little early but yeah if we can. And for a brief time while we set up camp it seemed the weather had turned. Yeah, no. Welcome to St. John's. Yeah, it's a rainy day. Day two in St. John's broke just as had been predicted. Oh you're fed up with the rain here in St. John's just like you were in Alaska. Okay, I get it. You're a crazy dog. So it's our first full day in St. John's. They've changed the weather forecast no more two to four inches of rain. It's now three to five inches of rain. So good day to get some shopping done and get the oil changed in the truck. With the rain not letting up, we decided to treat ourselves for dinner and headed to the center of St. John's Entertainment District, George Street. George Street is not that busy tonight. This is nice weather if you're a duck. Here we are, entrance only. After you. George Street is known for pubs and outside activity and music and flooding. The basement of our bar actually was flooding. It said something on the news today about the month of June. What was it? The St. John's movement had the entire amount of June rain in two or three days. And it was the wettest June in over 100 years. Yep. And this is July 2nd. And it's not improving. All right, let's go. And you know what? The rain did go away. So we headed to one of St. John's prettiest and best known neighborhoods, Kitty Vitty. So that's a unique burger that we forgot to take a picture of when we first got it. It's got chicken and beef. It's called the Leaping Tiger. And we're here at beautiful Kitty Vitty. I think we forgot to take a picture because we're just so shocked and confused by that bright thing up in the sky. I don't know what that is. The sun? I vaguely remember that. After our interesting lunch, we visited Kitty Vitty Brewery. Situated in an old fish processing plant, the brewery makes eight or more different beers and offers tastings. Okay. So we got you the Iceberg 1892, the happy accident version, and we have the Bog and Barrens Big Apple Goes on the end. Awesome. Thank you. Fruit aromas mingled with earthy tart flavors, backed by honey notes and fine carbonation, providing a depth of flavor that must be tasted to believe. Okay, go for it. Bog and Barrens. No. That is not what I expected. It's very sour. It says it's a ghost. I'm assuming a ghost is a sour beer. Obviously, we know nothing about beer. It's very different. I really like the 1892. This one's good. I would buy this one. Yeah, of the four we picked, definitely the best one. What do you think of Kitty Vitty? It is like every postcard you've ever seen. It's really, really that quaint, that pretty, that beautiful. It's been here for over 300 years. It's absolutely beautiful. And speaking of beautiful, St. John's is famous for its colorful row houses. Often called Jelly Bean Row, you can spend hours walking around taking in this delightful downtown area. That's my favorite color. I like that one. That is beautiful, isn't it? From what we could learn, Foucault says the houses were painted brightly so that sailors and fishermen returning from the sea on a foggy day could easily spot their homes from aboard their boats. Is this deep enough for you? Yeah, it's pretty steep. The harbor's there, the main drag is right here, and they closed it off for pedestrians. It's Water Street. So this is the start of George Street here. This is where all the pubs are. It's just noon, so we're missing all the live music here. But George Street's a little drier than the last time we were here. And when you're downtown, there's one other unique neighborhood worth exploring. The Battery. For hundreds of years, the houses of this outport have clung to the cliffs overlooking St. John's Harbor entrance. The Battery's incredibly narrow streets made for a fun walk or drive. Perched above the Battery at the very top of the entrance to St. John's Harbor is the National Historic Site, Signal Hill. How about right here? Here you'll find epic views of the city and the Cabot Tower built in 1897. You might also find a Newfoundland dog. Known as the lifeguards of the high seas, Newfies, as they are affectionately called, are as loyal as they are physically imposing. He wants to play, Ranger. But that doesn't stop Ranger from saying hi. I still outweigh you. Get up. Come on. Get up. You want to play, don't you? There's also an extensive trail system to access from atop Signal Hill. Cindy and Ranger set off headed for the Signal Hill Visitor Center below. Come on, buddy. Let's go. The Visitor Center has a small museum explaining the vital roles Signal Hill has played from the 1700s up to World War II when St. John's became a hugely vital allied shipping port and naval base. All right, what are you trying to do here? Firing the noonday gun at exactly noon and you had to get it to the second was really important. Congratulations, you're hired. It also highlights Signal Hill's unique place in history and the location where Marconi received the world's first transatlantic wireless transmission in 1901. You typing out Cindy area? Yeah, anyone on the other end is like, oh my gosh, she's so slow. Far east as you can drive in North America. And just a short drive south is another National Historic Site, Cape Spear. That's quite the view. It is. Oh, it looks so small now. Yeah, and you can just make out the right up there, the Cabot Tower on top of Signal Hill. How'd you get up there? You climbed? That's not in your nature. There's two lighthouses to visit at Cape Spear. The current one operating that was built in 1950. And then the original that goes back to the 1830s. Not bad at all on yourself. And because Cape Spear is a National Historic Site, Parks Canada has staff here, including inside the old lighthouse keepers residence to answer questions. So what would normally be in the report? You would be logging weather conditions, any vessels you had contact with, who's working what shift, how long the lights are burning each night. You'd be tracking how quickly you're burning through your supplies so you know when it's time to order more. If you want to have a look, we do have an original logbook here. Oh, okay. It was a lot of paperwork. And that's really part of why this was a prestigious position at the time because literacy rates were only about a third in a setting like this 200 years ago. Right. But to be a light keeper, you'd not only have to be fully literate, but have enough knowledge of math to do some accounting, have background knowledge on weather conditions, navigation. Awesome. Thank you. Wake up and bump your head. Sperm oil. I assume that's what they burned in their in their lamps. So the young lady who was doing the calligraphy in the lighthouse build, it was telling me that these flags belong to different shipping companies. And when the lighthouse keeper would spot a ship coming in, they would hoist their flag and that flag would be picked up by the people at the Cabot Tower over in Signal Hill. And they could then alert the the various companies at the docks in St. John's to there's a ship coming in and they could call their crews in to prepare for loading and unloading. There's a survey peg. This is as far east as you can go in North America. Other than Greenland. So we're going to head over to Bell Island today. It's only a 20 minute drive from our campground here in St. John's to the ferry dock. And it's a 25 minute crossing. But one of the things we do recommend is we printed out the schedule for any of the ferries that we might encounter on this trip because cell service has been so hit and miss. It's been really handy having things a hard copy. Hey there. How's it going? Good. I assume this is the way to Bell Island. Yeah, perfect. How many? Uh, there's two of us. Seniors, yeah. There's the Beaumont Hamel that we've been on. It is quite small compared to the Legionnaire that we're traveling on today. Easier because you don't have a trailer to pull. How you doing? Oh, I didn't know we needed to keep that. Hang on a second. We're gonna have to find it. We put them away. They're okay? Okay, thank you. Our main reason for visiting Bell Island was to visit number two mine. Mine tour now for me, if you would. The Bell Island mines, stretching miles under the waters of the North Atlantic, were some of the biggest sources of iron ore in the world in the 1900s and a vital supplier to the allied countries during both world wars. They torpedoed on one of those ore ships. It missed the ship and it came on land, destroying the Scotiaphire, making us the only ones in North America to come under direct land attack by Germany. Closed in 1966, the number two mine is now a fascinating living museum. So we were fortunate enough back in 1954 that Josef Kirsch was invited here to Bell Island and he took all the photos starting on the corner wall up here, going all the way down. Now, I always like to draw attention to this photo down here, folks. I call him the Red Skelton of Bell Island. For the younger generations, you may look and see Robin Williams. I always say Red Skelton. He seems to have the same character as Red did. Once we were done in the museum, it was time to don hard hats and for a safety briefing. Warnings. Heart condition, lung disease, asthma, fear of enclosed spaces or difficulty walking up inclines. Everybody is good. Safety hats stays on your heads at all time while we're down in the mine. Please do not touch the walls of ore while you're down there. And if for any reason you change your mind, you want to come off our tour, please come let me know. I'll radio for someone to come meet you. You can't leave the mine on your own. All right, folks. We are now approximately 17 feet underground already and right where we are standing, there were two sets of tracks. The tracks were used to haul the ore cars in and out by cable system. So what would happen, the miners would come down into the mine, do a 10-hour shift, then there was a two-hour break. That gave time for all the miners to go out of the mine and the next shift to come in. When this mine first opened in 1902, there was no electricity here on the island and the only source of light for the miner was a candle. Now folks, the miners would take a candle, they would strap it on or tie it on to a soft cloth hat and they would be using those picks, shovels, drills and dynamite. These are the cold, dark, dense conditions that the miners were working in all those years ago. All right everyone, you're going to start feeling the true temperature of the mine which is seven degrees and it stays at seven degrees all year long. All right, crosscut number nine. I'm going to shine my light down there for you. On the wheels and the axle of the ore car they used, it was the smallest ore car. It held 1.8 ton of iron ore and surely you can all hear what I'm hearing right now. Water, not the ocean, but water and there's always water running down through the mines. You can check on either side of the slope, you can see it's trickling on down. Now folks, that's the true wet, slippery, dangerous conditions that the miners were working in all those years ago. They certainly weren't walking on a pine build up of gravel like we are here today. The miners called that the ribs of the mine and that's how it fractured after it was blasted or called fractured. Now the seam of ore again is 17 feet high and it continues on 17 feet for approximately two and a half to three miles under the waters off Conception Bay. And by the way folks, women were not allowed in the mine. They were considered bad luck to the miners. I think we would have been a distraction myself. All right everyone, we are at crosscut number 16 and we're about to enter the barn area. As I mentioned in the museum, we had horses that worked underground. Now the large draft horses, they were used to carry empty ore cars back to the miners to get reloaded. And the horses and ponies, they were used to carry the tools and the equipment to the miners wherever it was needed. For an operation, the water was continuously pumped out and fresh air was pumped in. But when they closed the mines down in 1966, they shut off all the pumps and they allowed the mines to float. But if you look to where I'm shining my light out there, you can see the water meets the ceiling or the back wall. That water out there is 17 feet deep and it continues on 17 feet deep on that 10 degree slope for approximately two and three miles under the waters off Conception Bay. So I have to say the mine tour was fascinating and even more so because the guides have close family connections to the mine itself. And thank you all once again. Thank you. Yeah. Is that an eagle? What are you looking for? And if you have a bit of extra time, you can take in some of Belle Island's rugged beauty. Beautiful caves and everything. You're gonna think I'm crazy. The cave right by the beach. Does it not look like there's a crocodile in there? Oh, yeah. There's no crocodiles in Newfoundland. Next to the Belle Island lighthouse, we discovered the Light Keepers Cafe. It was a great spot to sit, sip, and watch for whales. So your toes can just touch, eh? And I got long legs. Yeah, they're comfy. To me, it looks like a lifeguard's chair. Do you need rescuing? And before we boarded the ferry for our return trip, people said that we had to try the fish and chips at Dick's Restaurant right near the ferry terminal. We were glad for the tip. It was the very best fish and chips of our Newfoundland odyssey. The ferry is coming. The ferry is coming. We headed back towards St. John's, but we had a stop to make. Look at how sheer that rock wall is. I mean, it looks like it's been chiseled off, doesn't it? One of the things we'd hoped to see in Newfoundland was the capelin rolling on a beach, and we'd heard they'd been spotted near Middle Cove Beach, just north of the city. There weren't any capelin when we arrived, but it was obviously a beautiful spot, popular with many of the locals. Just before we wrap up, we would be remiss not to mention the rooms. Cindy, do you see how long this squid is? This art gallery and museum has fascinating displays and artifacts. We spent a couple of hours here and enjoyed every second. If you're a history buff, we think you'd enjoy it too. Finally, we just wanted to provide a few details about our campground in St. John's. Tippie Park has 217 sites, many with full hookups, and it's less than $50 a night. The park is well kept by the city and offers a very convenient base from which to explore the St. John's area. So, just some final thoughts. We really enjoyed St. John's, so much so that we extended our trip for a couple days, but we felt like we still didn't see everything that we wanted to. Yeah, one thing we had hoped we might be able to do was get up super early and get to Cape Spear and watch the sunrise and be the first people in North America to watch it, but Cape Spear was still beautiful and fascinating in the middle of the afternoon. If you enjoyed this episode, please hit the like button. It does help Google know that you did value the content. And also, please hit the subscribe button so you won't miss our next video. When we visit the town made famous by Jimmy Kimmel, Tildo, and Gander, a small town steeped in aviation history and more recently, one that played an immense role during the tragic and horrific events of 9-11. Center, Air India 113. Our alternate airport is Toronto. May we go to Toronto? Air India 113, Center. Negative, you must now land at Gander. Turn right heading 320. Returning right heading 320.