Experiencing Canada: Newfoundland and Labrador (Episode 01)
newfoundland and Labrador is a mix of color and harshness And with the landscape making you feel like you are literally on the edge of the world it's easy to see why they call this place the rock But it could be argued that the people here are the friendliest in the world And time and again they've proved that by welcoming people from far away with open arms You don't turn your backs on people in need is what they say here This is a province with natural wonders out of thisworld adventures a vibrant culture and more than a few barrels of rum I'm Nathan I'm on a journey across Canada and in this episode I'm going to see what the most easterly edge of North America is all about [Music] Yeah Yeah [Music] [Music] Newfoundland and Labrador is a product of our English Irish French and indigenous heritage The Vikings even hung out here a thousand years ago This place is home to the oldest European settlement and one of the oldest cities in North America St John's And before I venture out to explore I'm going to kiss a cod and wash it down with some rum It's what you do to become an honorary Newfoundlander Of course they call it screeching in I was born a Newfoundlander but hey it never hurts to embrace one's roots again Am I right And one person that knows all about it is Skipper Lukey of the world famous Christians Pub Time to get screeched in Well Skipper Lukey you're a legend here on George Street at Christians You're experiencing St John's You're going to find out about George Street It has most bars per square foot in Canada Uh we do have a a fair number of drinking establishments here in downtown St John's For sure How did the tradition of you know taking a shot of Screech and kissing a cod Where did that all originate It was a ceremony that was introduced by the Americans many years ago when there was a military base here in Newf Finland And it was a way that new military people would be welcomed to the base by Newfoundlanders They had a certificate there written in old English and it had icebergs and whales and puffins and codfish and lobster It was beautiful When the military base pulled out of here they uh rebranded the ceremony the screeching ceremony welcoming people from all over the world to Newfoundland And the ceremony's been performed hundreds of thousands of times across the island So what you're about to experience is a little bit of improv some comedy um some storytelling and a little touch of magic I mean just tell me about you know what do you want people to take away from being screeched in You're going to take away exactly the experience that you gather from it And people have told me that uh it's a world-class ceremony They've seen cultural ceremonies all over the world but this is uh their favorite [Music] Harry Harry Harry Let's bring the royal order of screechers to order I understand we got a bunch that want to get shre in here tonight Hopefully becoming right proper honorary Newfanlanders The idea of the ceremony is to teach you a little bit about Newfanland I believe in kitchen parties not raves I believe in icebergs and blue stars and at the puffin is a true proud and noble bird mispronounced Newfoundland not New Foundland or New Finland This is the real Newf Finland codfish Given the chance this fish could have grown to the height of 6 feet tall and weighed as much as 140 lbs This fish will not grow any more than this because it's dead We used to trade our fish with the Jamaicans for their rum We love rum We loved it so much we would actually get that on that warf and we would kiss the fish goodbye But knowing it was coming back to us in the way of rum Up the lips over the gums Look out Gullet Here it comes Lock your bags Tears Oh power vested in me I now declare you all honorary of the landers [Applause] What a great way to start my adventure in my home province Now that I've been officially screeched in with all these new Newfoundlanders I'm going to head north of St John's to Trinity to see the wild side of this great [Music] province Trinity is a picturesque town with a rich past and bright future It's home to about 200 and these two represent half of all the children in this town There's a lot to do in the area including spotting whales and icebergs And if you visit at the right time you might just see one passing through what they call Iceberg Alley And if it's an ocean safari that you're after then there's no better place to visit than Trinity [Music] Ecoours Ready for a day at sea I'm out here in Trinity with Skipper Bob tell me a bit about what we're going to experience out here on the water Oh today we're going to see a wide range of things I'm hoping I don't refer to it as whale watching I call it an ocean safari So whatever's available on the open Serengeti that's what we're going to get The fog is part of life here and the locals have learned to embrace it [Music] You're seeing people probably the first time they're seeing a whale in their lifetime What's what's that feeling It must you know be fun to take that those people out Oh it's thrilling I mean like when the from the moment the whales the last whale leaves until they come back the next year I can't wait Providing that new experience to somebody that hasn't seen that before is a is a privilege I guess it's honestly Okay we've been chasing the water We've been seeing it spouted up in the blow hole and we got up close It's a fin whale So they pop up they dive down quite deep much deeper than the humpbacks at that but we got to see it up close personal Wow Second biggest whale in the world right there Nowadays you know so many whales are endangered showing people these animals upfront is is that going to you know help conservation do you think to get people to care about these animals Oh absolutely I mean there's no doubt that showing people whales taking them to their habitat is helping to preserve and conserve their their territories and their numbers And it's also iceberg season What is iceberg season like Is it difficult to plan your trip around seeing an iceberg at the right time How do you forecast them You really can't forecast them You live in hope And those icebergs will cave off a Greenland And it takes them two to three years to get here Whales and icebergs aren't the only attraction here For some it's a love affair with a more colorful creature The province's official bird the Atlantic puffin Here these lovable sea parrots make up the largest puffing colony in North America and helped to make Newfoundland and Labrador a major destination for bird watching Mark Gray has captured more than his fair share of them with his camera It's great to see you out here in Trinity I mean I've seen so many of your pictures And when did you decide I want to uh put this place on the map I I kind of got into it through my phone probably you know and got out exploring more The more I got out exploring that's when I realized like listen like we have such a beautiful area When people come here you know they're drawn by these puffins I mean they're they're the official bird of Newfanland What's the best way to take a picture of a puffin They're they're a very cute creature They're they're nicknamed the clowns of the sea and and that's for a really good reason Where I live in Bonav Vista we have two puffing sites two puffin colonies One is at Cape Bonav Vista right behind our our lighthouse and the other uh the other puffing site is in the neighboring town of Ellison which is just about 5 to 10 minutes away we'll say Uh lots of times people will go there and they'll only take like 5 or 10 minutes and the puffins at that point in time the puffins could be out at sea and getting food I I would tell people like you have to be patient and for me as a photographer an amateur photographer with all the pictures that I do take of the puffins patience is definitely the key You've developed a knack for it I'll tell you that It's a lot of practice a lot of fun It's so great to to be here and meet you Thank you so much It's been excellent talking with you Nathan I really appreciate it [Music] After chatting with Mark I embarked on my own mission to capture some puffins And it proved to be one spectacular trek [Music] Heat Heat [Music] After all that hiking and puff and watching it was time to unwind So I came down to Clark's Beach to meet Peter the co-owner of the Newfoundland Distillery Company the first craft distillery in Newfoundland to use locally grown barley as the base spirit for many of its products [Music] Well it's great to be here Peter The Newfoundland Distillery Company I mean you think about the drinking culture in Newfoundland People have been drinking the old black rum for ages but this is the first distillery to open in over a century in Newfoundland The Newfoundland Distillery Company opened in 2017 How does Newfoundland approach alcohol Um I think enthusiastically you know they everybody sort of enjoys either a glass of beer or rum or actually wine or spirits or whiskey all sorts you know at the end of the day or sometimes even at lunchtime What is the response been to having a local spirit here to try Well I think we've been really lucky Everybody's been really sort of on side We've been buying all our spirits and we were also fortunate to win some awards early on so people could then go "Oh actually it's award-winning so it must be quite good We'll try it." I think in every bottle we like to say we put a little bit of the province So even so our gins we've got cloudby gin which sort of bake apples picked in the bogs We've got our seaweed gin which is seaweed from the grand banks The junipers all handpicked locally So we've always sort of putting local botanicals into our bottles Yes And kelp is one that kind of stands out because you know the ocean is everywhere you look here Now you can put it in your drink What does that taste like When we originally wanted to make gunpowder and rose rum we wanted to put real gum powder in But Health Canada weren't convinced So we we found local alternatives and there's salt peter and for that we used newfound sea salt That was easy but sulfur was harder Then we realized that kelp is a natural source of sulfur So we used that and then we tasted real gum powder and then we mocked up the flavors to taste like real gum powder too Tell me about the bake apple specifically I remember it picking it when I was growing up in Newfoundland Uh now you're calling it the cloud berry It's infused in the gin I mean what has been the response to having that flavor in a drink Everybody in the province knows exactly what a baked apple is and it should be called baked apple gin But because we export it outside the province more people know what clouds are than baked apples It grows in bogs They're like sort of yellow raspberries but they're slightly um more citrusy And then we've got this lovely citrusy gin And I think goes brilliantly in the grain which is one of my favorite drinks It's great for people to stop here and get that taste that local taste here but this is kind of you're you're exporting this around Canada You know it's very exciting to sort of be going across Canada and but to still be in the province because you know this is where we're from and we really want to be for everybody in the province and people who come to visit us but at the same time we want to be for everybody in Canada as well It's been quite the success What do you think uh people are taking away from this having this opportunity to try the local drink Well I mean hopefully they'll all sort of get a sense of place and you know feel that they're really enjoying something that's made right here in the province and you know get some of the flavors or if you want to be fancy the teroir of the province and you know in the taste from here they can see the distillery see how everything's made learn more about it and enjoy it and just have a bit of [Music] fun Okay So now we're going to make a Negrroni if you're up for that If you pick up the cocktail shaker at the bottom of the cocktail shaker All right Here you go And put some ice in How much ice A lot Yeah You want to be generous We're making a double which some people say but I think it's much more fun I like doubles So yeah if you put fill that up twice and then pour it into there each time So we need that And then you need to put the bitters in Okay Easy does it And that's the bitters Okay And now we're on to the next stage which is our apparatif which is made with lots of local botanicals like parch roenbury and all sorts of fun things that we made with a restaurant called tear So now you poured everything in Now you got to pick up the spoon and you got to stir it around It's a long spoon And so now the next stage is I'm going to put the big trendy ice cubes into our drinks cuz the reason you have great big trendy ones is that they don't melt so quickly So the drink lasts a lot longer [Music] And then we want to just do a little garnish And I find a dehydrated orange is a very easy garnish Okay So that's the final little flourish [Music] That's fantastic work I think you're a natural You're hired I don't know where you're going to go after this but you're staying here All right I'm excited to try the bake apple or cloud berry gin Here we go Cheers Cheers Cheers Cheers Cheers [Music] just like I remember picking it Thank you so much for having me here You know I learned a lot about the local spirits Well thank you very much for coming [Music] Well it's back on the road for me Next up some more nature I'll be taking a look at the incredible geology and plant life in Newfoundland and getting a better appreciation for the province that I grew up [Music] in At times the terrain here makes it seem like it's a different planet Newfoundland and Labrador doesn't just have geology it's got worldclass geology and scientists from all over the world come here to study the world's evolution as told by its rocks and fossils at the Johnson Geo Center on Signal Hill Dr Rod Taylor knows all about it What excites you when you look at these rocks here What what do you want to tell people about Oh mostly there's so much information The rock itself first formed about 565 million years ago off the north coast of what is Africa today and it moved north and then about 400 million years ago it collided with the side of North America As a result of that basically we've got this material from Africa on the west coast of the island On the east coast of the island we've got a combination of material from North America the Canadian shield and some more recent sedimentary rocks that have formed And the center of the island is all the ocean floor that was between them that's been compressed and raised up Tell me why is it that people are drawn here for the rocks I think one of the reasons is within a fairly small amount of space you can actually get to see a lot of different rock types that cover a lot of different geological time periods So within 2 or 3 hours you can explore more than 150 million years of geological history And a lot of these places have the fossils that are associated with those time periods as well which tells us just an incredible amount of information So tell me about this I mean you find this on the beach What are you thinking If you found this on the beach you'd be a very very lucky person This is a specimen from mistaken point and it's actually a cast of the specimen It's called fractusis And there's a midline running down through And we can see there are paired branches running on either side And if you look up close you can even see there are small branches within each of those branches And that's what we call fractal branching But we don't find it in nature today It's a body and design that's completely disappeared So these fossils are incredibly valuable because they're the oldest known animals on the planet So why do they call it the rock Now that actually I can give you a short answer for uh between about 10,000 and 25,000 years ago Newfoundland was covered with a series of glaciers As they moved along and scraped over the surface they dug everything off the top And every one of those glaciers moved towards the ocean And every one of them dug deeper into the ground and scraped it away So they call it the rock because it's pretty much a rock Fascinating All right Well thank you so much for uh joining me here today You're very welcome My pleasure But on this rock there's a lot of natural beauty And if you're looking to unplug and find your zen there's no better place than this The Memorial University Botanical Garden Nestled amidst a tranquil boreal forest It offers an array of cultivated gardens and winding trails and seemingly makes the time stop Okay So Newfoundland it's not the first province that comes to mind when you think of gardening The soil's not that deep That's right But you do get some resilient plants Absolutely Yeah Uh you know the plants that we're walking through right now is this is in the Newfaland heritage garden So these are all plants that have been brought to Newfaland by the people who came from Europe generally and settled here I bet some of those plants didn't get through the first winter but the ones that did are still here And you can still go to like abandoned communities in Newf Finland that people haven't lived in in years and you can still find some of these plants still growing them on their own And this is this is what we do We create these boardwalks where it's necessary Uh we trim plants so that people can walk through the canopy and really get a sense that they're in the woods but be in a really kind of protected safe place to do that Throughout the province there are different ecosystems that specialize in different groups of plants naturally Uh but we are in the boreal forest now which is spruces and furs and pines and all those evergreens that you expect to see but it's also birches and larches and all those deciduous materials It's an amazing ecosystem really and so we're in a part of it here now and it really does exemplify the boreal forest and as you walk through here you almost you can feel the sense of calm I I know Hey isn't it great And that's the beauty of spaces like this you know it's really I think they're really important because you know where else are you going to get this feeling I would encourage people wherever you live to kind of find these spaces because they are everywhere Every community has a natural space because they'll they really do make you feel good And again when people come to visit people who are not from here especially if they've only got a short time to be in in St John's for instance they can actually experience the wild of Newfoundland just by by coming down here to the botanical garden And you don't get much more natural beauty than Newfoundland That's true Yeah I agree I'm I'm a little bit biased My trip to Newfoundland has been such a wonderful adventure and I'm excited to see where my adventures take me next Until then happy trails [Music] Hey hey hey [Music] [Music]
2025-04-09 00:23
