Laundromats And Birds Birds Birds!

Ahoy!

This blog entry is being written in the office of the hostel on a rare cloudy (and perhaps even wet) morning in St. John's.  Coffee is in hand and Coltrane's "A Love Supreme" is filling my personal airspace, just like in the good old days.  Screeching seagulls only add to the ambiance.

The last entry found us on the cusp of a very busy weekend.  Martin and Felix took a well-deserved sojurn to the Skerwink Hostel, for a few days of hiking and relaxation.  Which meant that Krissy and I were on our own to run this place and, a few minor setbacks aside, all went well, though we were right tuckered out by the end of it.

Thursday was the day of the big office move and that went pretty smoothly, especially since we really didn't have to do much aside from watch the movers bring in stuff and then organize it to our liking.  The office now doubles as a common room and while we were worried that it would be chaos it has actually turned out quite okay.  It's much easier to get to know the guests when there is some sort of common area to hang out in and, since we are already here if we are working, we are less inclined to bugger off.  Because, well, we are working and are kind of tied to our desk.

We did have a crazy start on Thursday.  We started off the day by getting both the washer and the dryer replaced.  The dryer ran two loads and then died.  Being a busy hostel, there is always a ton of laundry to do, so I bagged up what I could and high-tailed it to the laundromat while Krissy held down the fort.  We made it an early evening.  After that day it was necessary.  Woke up at 4am to the sounds of two of our guests gettin' busy in the alley, right outside my window.  In my camp chairs, no less.  It was just wrong.  Even worse, I came out in the morning to find one of the chairs broken.  It was really annoying but I found it to be more funny than anything.

Friday we got up early and Krissy opened the office and I started in on the cleaning.  We tagged each other in and out so that neither of us had to do it all (it's an easy job but it gets so hot in here, especially on the top floors, that it can still take a bit out of ya).  Mostly spent the day hanging out in the office/common room - which I have dubbed "The Parlour", a name that is beginning to stick - and chatting with guests.  The dryer got repaired so there was a whole day of washing to do and that kept us busy.  Spent a good amount of time maintaining my alertness with coffee which was a must because we were to have a late night.

After we closed up the office at 9pm we got ourselves cleaned up and headed down to the Ship Pub to see three bands.  Along with Krissy and myself were Regine (Genie, Gini, etc) and another guest, Alison.  The point of going was to see Green And Gold which is a fantastic local band.  You may remember me mentioning a show I went to last week at the Rose & Thistle.  Two of the guys who played in two of the bands that night (Steve and Len) have another band, actually their main band, and they were booked to play the Ship.  They weren't scheduled to go on stage til 1am (and it wound up being closer to 2 when they actually took the stage) but there were two other bands on before.  I can't remember the name of the first act, which was an acoustic duo that may have been called Rake & Rube, or something like that.  They were pretty good but I couldn't hear them all that well.  The performer in me could totally sympathize with them, having to play in such a loud, chattery place.  The second act, The Mayhemingways, is a duo from Ontario who happen to be on tour right now.  The main guy sings and plays guitar, banjo, and accordion (though never at the same time, but he does play bass with footpedals) and there is a drummer as well.  They were fantastic, kind of an alt.country sort of thing and the singer, at least at times, reminded me a lot of Jay Farrar.  Krissy bought their CD which was a wise move.  Unfortunately her unwise move found her outside when the band closed their set with perhaps the greatest cover of Springsteen's "Atlantic City" I have ever heard, played on accordion no less.  I wish I had video of that.  Most excellent. Then it was time for Green And Gold and they really did a great job.  They played most of their album as well as some new songs.  Looking forward to hearing those tunes again some day.  It was nice to see Steve and Len again though it was very crowded and oh so loud in there so we did not get to chat much.  Despite having to get up early on Saturday to work it was totally worth it.

Got back to the hostel and found that someone had stolen our camp chairs from the alley.  I mean, one of the chairs was broken and they only cost eleven bucks anyway but that was still annoying.  I liked those chairs.  Buncha savages in this town.

Oh yeah, you may remember me talking about the cat, Jarjar, who hangs around the hostel and sleeps in our room sometimes.  Well, Jarjar has a twin.  And, I mean, an identical twin.  So who really knows which cat is here when.  Except that one day last week, the twin made an appearance when Jarjar was here.  Our minds were thoroughly blown.

Seeing double?

But we know which is the real Jarjar.

Saturday we got up and co-ran the hostel for the day.  Unfortunately we woke up to find that now the washing machine had crapped out.  I don't know where the owner of the hostel got these machines but he definitely got hosed.  Couldn't get a repair guy for a couple of days so there was another trip to the laundromat in store.  This time Krissy went while I held down the fort.  The Parlour strted to come into its own on Saturday.  One of the guests, Kelby, hung out here pretty much all day and he gave me a hand with some things as well so that was cool.  Others would pop in and out throughout the day and it was fun to hear about their adventures.

That is one thing I really like about working in these hostels.  I love hearing about people's adventures and seeing that excited look in their faces as they tell their stories and listen to mine.  There is such a different attitude and mentality among travelers - everyone is not only nice but also just totally psyched to be doing what they are doing.  As friendly as I was with customers at the bank, and as cordial as I may have been with them, those interactions come nowhere close to the kinds I have in this environment.  It almost makes me want to run a hostel of my own.

Also while Krissy was out she got a new tattoo.  It was part one of a two-part design so there will be no photos until the thing is finished.  I will just say that it is pretty cool and she is a bit of a badass for getting it.

Saturday night saw the parlour in full swing.  Since it is in the office it's technically supposed to be locked up at 9pm, when we close up shop, but if at least one of us is in there then we can keep it going as long as we like.  I think we wrapped it up around 1:30 or so and had a good time shooting the bull and drinking beers.  Kelby and I took a walk down to Smoke's and got some poutine (I went for the double pork...mmm) and had a good old time.  Having a room like this makes this hostel a lot warmer and it is much easier to get to know the guests, which is one of my favorite parts of this whole experience.

Sunday we got up and it was more of the same - flopping in the office and hanging out with guests.  Martin and Felix returned from Skerwink and Martin dealt with the inevitable laundromat trip and we held down the office for the day.  Really not that much else to report for the day.  After we closed up the office we hung out for a while.  Felix was jamming on my travel guitar and I was playing my mandolin and we had a right nice little jam.  It was the first time I'd played anything in weeks and the only time so far that I have played with someone else so that was nice.

Since we'd been holding down the fort for so long we had the next two days off and had plans to take a road trip.  However, we didn't wake up on Monday til about noon....oh it was so nice to sleep in.  So we basically wrote the day off as a lazy one.  Hung around the hostel for a bit and then went out and did laundry for ourselves as well as the hostel (turns out the washer repair dude came while we were out....at least now all is well).  That is pretty much it for the day.  Made dinner and had an early night because we had plans in store for the next day.

Woke up early on Tuesday and hit the road, headed for Cape St. Mary's, which is in the southwest corner of the Avalon Peninsula, about two hours away.  The weather down there is usually hit or miss, and is often more miss (mostly due to fog) but it turned out to be quite a nice day.  Cape St. Mary's is an ecological reserve and is home to over 50,000 birds.  Most of those birds take up residence on the sides of the cliffs as well as the entirety of a moderate-sized sea stack, no more than ten metres from the coast.  Gannets are the most prevalent species there but there are also thousands of Murre, Kittiwake, Guillemot, and Razorbill, among others.  It was fantastic to watch their little societies in action, and watching them swirl around and dive and it was so, so, so loud.  Krissy took about a thousand awesome photos and I shot some video that only scratches the surface of what we witnessed.

Reader beware - I am going to make up for lack of other photos by posting a BUNCH from the birds, right here:

See how that rock is colored white?  That is all gannets.  Thousands of them.

More white cliffs of gannets.

More of Cape St. Mary's rugged coast

And even more of it.

Below every blur is a diving bird.

Gannets!

Gannets, close up.

This murre is especially murry.

So many birds.

Mama and a baby gannet.

This gannet rules the roost.

Seriously.  It is this absurd.

This choir of gannets sings for their supper.

And this one stands in judgement of them all.

There is also a lighthouse there and we went down to that.  It was totally utilitarian and nothing special except there were like three dozen sheep there, just free-ranging it.  Every time I got close to them they would scatter which was a bummer but they were still cool to watch.

Probably the ugliest lighthouse in all of Newfoundland.

Sheep.

One of them sheep's got my number.

The fence goes to the end of the world.

Hit the road after that and started making our way back up the coast. We stopped at a pebble beach somewhere along the way (honestly, i have no idea where it was) and had a nice picnic lunch and then spent a good while playing the "rock" game, chucking rocks from the beach, aiming for the boulders in the water.  We didn't keep score but we very much enjoyed watching the rocks bounce around, like on a crazy wide range roulette wheel, before settling on their final resting spot.  Sometimes the rocks would shatter and I'll admit that I kinda felt like a jerk when that would happen even though it was kinda cool to watch.

Rocks, as far as you can see.  I tried to dig a hole by removing stones but it just kept going.

Many of these rocks were tossed into the sea.  Sometimes we'd hit the boulder and they'd come bouncing back.  One particularly large one broke and a piece shot back and hit Krissy in the leg.   We've collected stones from all over this place, for a future rock garden, but that little piece is goin' in the scrapbook.

A wave crashes on one of many boulders we were aiming for.

Our next stop was a spot called Castle Hill which was an old fort from the time of the French.  There wasn't too much there aside from the ruins of the fort and a museum but it was still cool to see.  There is a nice view of the town of Placentia from the top of the hill and there was a bit of decent hiking there.  Krissy stayed below and read under a tree while I explored up top.

Hans invades and conquers the Fort Louis.

Some of the remains of Fort Louis.

The view of Placentia from Fort Louis

Made it back to the hostel and we were pretty tired so it was another early evening for us.  I woke up this morning and opened the office and even though I've had time to write this blog during my time today it's actually been quite busy.  Krissy just returned from her appointment with the tattoo guy and she won't be getting it finished until next Tuesday so there will be a further report and photos to follow then.

Krissy will be taking over in the office this afternoon and I will find some way to kill time today.  For the first time since we have been in St. John's it actually rained today.  It's been threatening rain just about every day but then we'd just end up with hot muggy days so it was nice that it cooled off but not so nice because the ground is now wet so walking around parks and such isn't really all that feasible.  But I may pay a visit to Fred's Records and will probably kick it around here.  While it is nice to be in a city that has so much to do it's also nice to have the option to just chill out.

UPDATE:  I did both, chilling out at the hostel for a while and then made my way down to Fred's.  You've heard me rant and rave about this store so I won't go into too much detail but I did pick up four CDs by local artists:

London Above: Creatures
Baytown: Island
Rogues: Edge Of The World
The Connexions: Connect Four

Of these bands, only Rogues has any real traces of traditional Newfoundland music, but it's really amped up, almost punk style.  London Above is really solid indie rock and they just have an EP; I think one of the dudes in the band works at the store.  Baytown reminds me of Agents Of Good Roots a bit, but with less hoarse vocals and maybe more of a diverse vibe.  And, lastly, the Connexions is one of the bands I saw a couple weeks ago at the Rose & Thistle.  Good, solid garage rock.  You guys should check some of this stuff out.  There is still so much music from here that I need to get hip on.  There will be at least one more trip to Fred's before I leave St. John's.

I don't have any of their CDs yet but a few other Newfoundland artists that you guys should Google or YouTube are:

Great Big Sea - by far the most successful Newfoundland band, these guys have toured the world and even broken it in the States.  They mix traditional Newfoundland music with modern rock and have some great songs.  Their version of "The Night Paddy Murphy Died" is by far the best anyone's done and their song, "Consequence Free", is an anthem of sorts for me.

Hey Rosetta - truly exquisite indie rock.  Their popularity is a close second to Great Big Sea, and they've played Bonnaroo and other jam-band festivals.  There is no trace of traditional music in their sound but it is epic nontheless.  The song, "Another Pilot", from the Plan Your Escape album is one of my favorite songs in the world.  The rest of the album is pretty awesome as well.

Shanneyganock - good traditional Newfoundland music with some modern rock touches, like a more downhome version of Great Big Sea.

Sherman Downie & The Ambiguous Case - Sherman mixes rock, folk, bluegrass, and country with a traditional Newfoundland vibe.  He's from Corner Brook, over on the west coast, near Gros Morne, and it shows up in his sound.  This guy is phenomenal.  And so is his band.  I could dedicate an entire blog entry to his music, and I probably will sometime.

Ron Hynes - he is Newfoundland's answer to Dylan.  A folksinger who has lived a hard life and has lived to tell about it.  There is an award-winning documentary called The Man Of A Thousand Songs, which I really want to see.

Buddy Wasisname and the Other Fellers - hands down the best band name ever, and one that so perfectly captures the spirit of Newfoundland.  They sing traditional songs and perform skits and are funny as hell.  They've been around forever and will probably be around forever as well.

And, of course, Green And Gold.



Anyway....so on the way back I picked up dinner from this Middle Eastern place called Mohamed Ali.  We've been lacking a bit in finding great ethnic food here but this place wins.  Very tasty indeed.,

Oh yeah, we have another volunteer here now.  Stefan, who is from Germany, is another fellow traveler who has been all over and he will be helping here for at least a month or so.  Very cool dude.  Welcome Stefan!

The last bit of news I have is that it is official - we will be returning to the Skerwink Hostel after we leave here, which will be on the 1st of August.  We will be there until about the 14th or so and we are very much looking forward to seeing everyone and being back in that environment for a little while longer.  It won't be the same without Dave there and we will miss the hell out of that dude but Kent will still be there, at least for the first week or so, and all the other usuals will surely be around, like Justin, Mel, and Melanie.  Michael Jordan is supposed to be in Mexico by then (or by now actually) but we'll soon see if that really happened.  And we are looking forward to meeting Martha, who is running the place now and is of the family who owns the hostel.  Apparently the little house next door that we were working on is now finished, or at least close to it, and the staff is living in there now.  That will be a nice change but hopefully it won't end up building a wall between us and the guests because we love interacting with the guests....at the same time, it will be nice to have a place to go when we are not in the mood or if the guests we have are particularly annoying.  We are also looking forward to doing the Skerwink trail a few more times and heading up to Elliston to see how the puffins are doing and of course dining at the Bonavista Social Club and just decompressing from the city before heading back towards uncharted territory.

From there we will be in Terra Nova, back in the tent, and then probably heading back up to Twillingate, Change Island, and Fogo Island.  Hopefully the weather there will be better than the last time we were there.  But that is getting a ways ahead of ourselves.  We still have over a week in St. John's and we intend to make the most of it.

As always, we miss you guys and wish you were here.