Back to solo travel again, the first leg required me to doggedly retrace my steps along Newfoundland’s main Highway all the way to Cow’s Head, the northernmost point we had reached as a group.
750 kms of previously traversed and viewed landscape.
Or so I thought.
Until I got a second notification from Canada Post that another parcel had arrived back on Nova Scotia and I had less than 5 days to collect it.
What a pain.
I’d given up on it (an extended battery for my phone arriving from the US) arriving – being due a month ago, but here it was and my current battery was barely lasting 5 hours between charges, so…
And ‘go where the road takes you’ is my motto.
A quick online booking later, and Charlotte and I were confirmed on the overnight ferry back to Nova Scotia – this time the longer one that we had not used on our way here.
A short wait in the afternoon sunlight ensued, watching 2 men effectively play a square version of ring-around-the-rosy with mowers to trim the lush grass, and we were following the road’s dictates.
And the road paid me back in spades.
Blue skies, calm waters and a beautiful sunset hinted at a good crossing
The entertainment on the ferry was a local singer songwriter, Joe Fahey, playing the dutifully expected Nova Scotian and Newfoundland classics along with a bunch of original stuff that I personally preferred.
A really skillful and talented muso, Joe had the somewhat sparsely populated lounge toe tapping and chair dancing along. Given the size of his audience, he even took a few requests, all interspaced with a little story telling along the way.
Between sets, Joe and I got talking.
We swapped stories, travel tales, philosphies on life, and discovered we are kindred spirits – somewhat restless, driven to explore, whilst simultaneously accepting of life and it’s many vaguaries.
He is an absolutely brilliant guy with one of the more interesting life stories I’ve heard. He has been a dedicated, yet somewhat itinerant musician for most of his life, chasing his own success, as well as tempering his dream to deal with family issues.
He works the ferry for a few months ever year during the main season, then spends time at home looking after family, gigging all around the local scene, and mixing in a bit of carpentry work to help fund the music dream chase.
Joe is a little older than me, and what I admired most was his tenacity in continuing to do the thing that he loved no matter the hardships and obstacles. And he has had a few thrown his way.
We ended up chatting for hours, at the end of which he insisted on pressing a CD of his originals, that he noted I liked, into my hands as an early birthday present.
He is genuinely one of the nicest and classiest guys on this trip – Joe , if you are reading, keep doing what you love!
The next day, after arriving back in North Sydney, it was a drive to pick up my parcel from the Glace Bay post office, (where the wonderful lady behind the counter remembered me), an afternoon ale at Breton Brewing, before the quick turnaround onto the ferry back to Port Aux Basques
A round trip of about 800 kms, with 2 overnight ferries, all for a phone battery that cost only a third of the fares on the boats!!
But worth every cent and kilometre.
