A Gros Morne National Park Adventure

Well, I am back from a wonderful week spent exploring one of Canada's, and maybe even one of the world's greatest national parks, Gros Morne National Park.  If you're ever wondering what to do in Newfoundland, a trip to this spectacular park is definitely worthwhile. 

After an 8 hour drive on the Trans Canada Highway from St. John's and many stops in beautiful towns and cities throughout Newfoundland, we finally made it to our destination on the West Coast of the Island. 

Gros Morne National Park camping is great when the weather is nice but the weather was not too great the first night.  The long range forecast didn't look too good but we managed to get to the far end of the park and set up camp just before nightfall. The next morning, we awoke to sunshine and it stayed that way for most of the week! So much for putting faith in the forecast, especially in unpredictable Newfoundland! 

The first day, Gros Morne hiking was on our minds.  We spent exploring the far end of the park. We started off the day with a stroll on the beautiful and very sandy beach close to our campground and than made our way to the Western Brook Pond Trail where we hiked 6 kilometers to a beautiful pond complete with a boat dock, out-of-this-world scenery and a lone moose strolling the shoreline in search of food and water! 

After this hike, we drove to The Arches Provincial Park where we saw some very unique rock formations and watched the sun go down. It was dark by time we made it back to camp and we were both too tired to start cooking anything to eat so we settled for fast food even though we had a car load of food that could have kept us going for about a year out there! 

That evening before bed, we realized we had a dilemma on our hands. We didn't have a lot of time in the park and would not be able to do everything we wanted to do and there were two hiking trails we wanted to do the next day; Gros Morne Mountain and Baker's Brook Falls. Upon sticking my head out of the tent first thing in the morning, our decision was made. It was foggy and the magnificent view that was said to greet hikers at the top of Gros Morne Mountain would be non-existent on this day. So, we hiked to Baker's Brook Falls instead and I'm glad we did! 

We spent some time there relaxing and enjoying the beautiful waterfalls and the fact that there was hardly anyone around. Just us and a vast wilderness in the middle of nowhere! The rest of our trip was spent exploring the small downs on the edge of the park and walking various leg stretcher trails in the park. I was most amazed by not only the spectacular scenery but at the diversity of the different areas in the park. One one end, it was sandy beaches and barren land while on the other end, it was mountains and high cliffs. 

The tablelands was the most diverse of all. On one side of the road was green rolling hills while the other side was reddish, rocky, snow capped mountains! Walking the tablelands trail felt like walking through a desert in the ol' west! 

We spent our last night in Gros Morne at the Campground in Trout River and again, it was nightfall by time we had our tent up and again we were too tired to cook. This time it was pizza. So much for packing all that food. On the plus side, we didn't need to buy much groceries when we got home as we already had a car load of food to bring back with us! The next morning, we packed up and hit the road for the long haul back to the Avalon Peninsula. 

We didn't head straight back to St. John's but instead stayed at my boyfriend's parents house for the night. One more night away from the city. It's always strange coming back here after being in the country for so long. The sound of traffic and sirens and construction right on my doorstep!