brigus

last weekend vernon and i went for a drive and ended up in brigus. brigus is a little fishing village about an hour from st john's on the other side of conception bay. it's right beside cupids if anyone knows where that is. anyway, it is a really beautiful spot and like all other places in newfoundland it has a lot of history. like it was home to a couple of really famous sea captains who did things like build the first 100 ton schooner in newfoundland and a couple of others who went on those early arctic quests to the north pole (one of them was actually in charge when peary claimed the north pole). the sea captains were of course all named Bartlett and were all related. it's a small small place, this newfoundland.
there is a tunnel at brigus that was blasted through the rock down to the water so that the bartlett ships could moor in deeper water closer to shore. you can walk through the tunnel today and come out at a little lookout. it's pretty. i took about 50 pictures of a seagull that was swimming around. none of them look nearly as artsy as i'd hoped and so you don't get to see them. :)

this is a view of the village from one of the (many) graveyards...

some boats in the harbour...

this is the little deep water bay that the tunnel takes you to...

a view from the united church (which is now a heritage site)...i don't know where the united people go to church...maybe they don't?...

one of the churches with the gates leading up to the graveyard surrounding it...


if you go to this wikipedia article it provides the 2001 census results for brigus. i find it interesting that 39.1% indicated catholic and 63.9% indicated protestant. no jewish or muslim or other. not even an agnostic, or unaccounted for.....it's either/or with everyone accounted for. of course, there were only 700 and some odd people there....but still.....
i guess this answers my "why is the united church a heritage site now?" question. apparently they only have need for the catholic and protestant churches.

today we might do a local hike, if the weather improves. hopefully it does and i'll have more pictures for you.