Jumping continents: A walk in Newfoundland: Bread and Cheese Point to Bull Head Light

I love the humour in Newfoundland names. There are plenty that are more famed, such as the village of Dildo which has many a postcard of its sign, but even a simple coastal walk, only 7km there and back, takes you from Bread and Cheese Cove, along Raspberry Bottom and The Flats, over The Oven headland before reaching your turnaround, Bull Head lighthouse. The many lighthouses are very much needed as the map shows there to be 19 wrecks on this one 3.5km stretch of coast alone, but it was not built until 1908, too late for every one of those 19 ships; the earliest recorded on my trail map is HMS Saphire, sunk just before, or in, the safety of the Bay Bulls harbour, in 1696. The ship names give indication of the families left behind: Ann, Sarah Jane, Marilyn Donald, Elizabeth E Annie, Thomas, Eliza, Dora, Frances Russell and so on. In 1701, both HMS Loyalty and HMS Asia were lost. I wonder if it was the same storm. These names are serious reminders of the dangers these early voyagers took on.

Like home, there is a Pulpit Rock, however this sea stack stands at 14.7m high, and the interpretation tells us that "if any worshipping took place at Pulpit Rock, it was done by duck hunters". Not for them our stories of hidden services in stinky pigeon infested caves during the Reformation. Perhaps they were hidden enough just being in Newfoundland, or perhaps I just haven't heard those stories yet.

Next weekend I might do the next part of the route, from Monkey Cove, past Bald Head River, Landing Place of Bald Head, Rust of Bald Head, Bald Head, Turn of Bald Head, Bight of Bald Head....I'm curious to know who had the bald head. Likewise, I wonder who the 'American Man' was that has a hill top named for him. Is there an unknown American buried their perhaps? No wonder this is a land of storytellers. Every place name charges the imagination. The short, overland route between Bay Bulls and Freshwater, before reaching the boggy marshes is called.....The Clappers. It was an old horsetrail. Other points of the map are more literal. Gull island for instance, within view on this walk and now a seabird ecological reserve is home to 'Shitting Cove Rock'. For sure there is plenty beside the scenery to keep me occupied.