accidental tourists and the big May Two-Four

The three of us set out this past Saturday to try to take a peek at an iceberg that was spotted near the town of Twillingate, NL. It's about a six hour journey from St. John's, so we decided to stop in Gander, and then make Twillingate a day-trip on Sunday, and then we'd come home on Monday. Monday was a holiday - Victoria Day.

We drove to Twillingate, but the iceberg had moved on. We tried to find somewhere to have lunch in town, but the all of the cafes were closed for the season still. We thought that it was really odd that they wouldn't have opened up for the long weekend! The only place that was open for lunch in Twillingate was Mary Brown's (which is less greasy than KFC, in case anyone has ever wondered).  Thankfully, Madeline liked the chicken fingers. On Monday, we wandered off our course home to step into Trinity. Our guide book described it as being a town that has transformed itself back to what it looked like in the 1800's, and it was supposed to have an interesting train. But when we arrived in Trinity, nothing was going on there either. Not even a place to have lunch! (It was pretty, though).

The May long weekend is traditionally the start of vacation season after a long winter. I couldn't fathom that nothing was open on our trip westward across Newfoundland.  A waitress at the restaurant we went to in Gander enlightened us. Tourist season in Newfoundland, she explained, begins the weekend after May Two-Four because everyone goes away for the long weekend. Well, they certainly aren't looking to have lunch anywhere ...

Sidenote: I stepped into the Shoppers in Gander, but they didn't have any Method cleaning products.

Comments

[Rhonda]

Hi, I love Trinity but it's a ghost town in the Spring. Go back to Trinity in the summer. They have a walking play that takes you around the town. My father grew up there and I have spent many a summer there as well. The train is not in the town, it's at Trinity Loop. Madeline will love the train ride.

[laura]

I think we will head back to Trinity - and check out Bonavista as well. I think we've learned our lesson about being tourists before June :)

[Jane]

We did the same thing - went to Trinity Saturday hoping for a walk and lunch and nothing was open! Luckily the Random Foodex let us all use their bathroom. We ended up driving to New Bonaventure for our walk around the Random Passage film set, then stopped at Greenings on the road back to Clarenville to finally have our lunch. I hope everyone in Trinity and Twillingate had a great May 2-4!

[laura]

No way, Jane!!! We got lunch at Greenings on Monday ... at least they were open :)