In Search of Puffins - Witless Bay, Newfoundland

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In Search of Puffins - Witless Bay, Newfoundland

The day dawned gray, overcast and raw and we dressed warmly, anticipating a cold ride. The boat left promptly at 10am and we headed to the Witless Bay Ecological Reserve. The Reserve is home to innumerable nesting seabirds, murres,cormorants, kittiwakes, storm petrels and most importantly an estimated 260,000 pairs of puffins… the largest Atlantic puffin colony in North America. 260,000 pairs! That’s over half a million puffins!

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St. John’s, Newfoundland’s Big Smoke

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St. John’s, Newfoundland’s Big Smoke

As we headed downtown, we were in search of St. John’s Jellybean Row. We drove down the city’s oldest street, Water Street, along the harbor. After some reading, I had learned that Jellybean Row or the Jellybean. Houses were not a specific street, but rather were many of the houses on the downtown hillside. Duckworth Street was a good place to begin. The brightly candy-colored row houses weren’t hard to find. They were everywhere!

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Fogo Island - A Great Auk & One Corner of the Flat Earth

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Fogo Island - A Great Auk & One Corner of the Flat Earth

The reward at the end of the trail was a 6.5’ (2m) tall cast-bronze statue of a great auk by American artist Todd McGrain. The great auk, a flightless bird that became extinct in the mid-19th century, used to thrive on these North Atlantic rocky shores.

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