Northeast Coast of Newfoundland/Summer 2023 Pt. 1

[Joseph Berkovitz]

The Easternmost Coast

If you drive southwest from New England on Interstate 95 and keep going down the East Coast, the weather gets warmer along the way, as does the ocean. The trees get bigger. After about 1,200 statute miles of driving, you reach the state of Florida, land of spring breakers and sunny subtropical recreation. Having arrived in Florida, you might order a cool refreshment from the beach bar.

This is a story about what can happen when 5 people and their kayaks travel about 1,200 miles in the opposite direction, namely, northeast. If you do this, instead of arriving in Florida, you will find yourself on the wild Northern Peninsula of Newfoundland, just south of Labrador. There, on one of the easternmost and least inhabited coastlines in North America, cool refreshments are already provided by nature in the form of icebergs. In this part of the world, a good time for spring break would be around the date of our trip: late June and early July.

Lorrie Allen, Phil Allen, Jason Kates, Janet Lorang and myself set off from Westport, Maine on Sunday, June 25, 2023. Our goal was to arrive in North Sydney, Nova Scotia in time for the overnight ferry to Channel Port-aux-Basques, Newfoundland.  As we began ticking off the seemingly endless miles, and even more endless kilometers, I reflected on the odd path that brought us here.

Birth Of The Trip

The idea for the trip was born in late 2021. David Mercer has an actual family connection to Newfoundland. I have an imaginary connection, but have wanted to visit since I was little. David and I both very much wanted to see icebergs and wildlife and kayak camp in a truly remote area ruled by nature. We decided to begin figuring it out.

We bought some books and guides—in fact, it turned out that few were available. The only kayaking guide to NL was long out of print and a bit thin on information for our preferred areas. Our thinking became more independent, with advice from people who lived there or who had paddled there. We would have to look at maps, pore over satellite images and take our best crack at a plan. John Carmody pointed us at a valuable book on Atlantic Canada weather, “Where The Wind Blows”.

There are many distinct places in NL to paddle which are very different from each other. However, the icebergs suggested that we visit the northeastern region of NL, as the ice travels south from Greenland on the cold Labrador Current before turning left and beginning to melt and shrink. This choice still left many options open. Eventually we settled on a shuttle trip of some 70 nm, in a hilly and rocky area of the Northeast Coast between Englee and Main Brook, NL. This bulge of land has an interior road network allowing vehicles to travel only some 40 miles to support the much longer shuttle route. Further north at the tip of NL would have been an option, but the topography seemed flatter and less varied. We wound up with an 8 day shuttle:

There were 3 tiny outports along the route reachable from the interior,  but there was no coastal road: it would be remote enough. Most camping spots were either deserted ports or coastal wilderness. (Many small towns in Newfoundland have been shut down by the government in recent decades, with residents moving to larger population centers.) Being so far north, this area would have more plentiful icebergs. There were also two large offshore islands, the Grey Islands, which would buffer incoming swell and shorten the offshore wind fetch.

In the summer, a large high pressure system hovers to the east of Newfoundland and the wind direction is generally southwest. So our paddling direction would be from south to north, with the land mostly to our west. The high landforms cause wind over the land to back to the left, so a southwest wind would give rise to “coastal divergence”: a band of calmer winds next to the coast. Conversely—we were warned about this by locals—northerly winds would converge and amplify next to the coast and yield “run and hide” conditions.

A 19th Century Guide To Kayak Camping

David and I were still a bit unsure about the best places to land and camp. Clearly there were miles of unprotected rocky shore with no safe landing zones, plus all-too-rare coves and harbors. At this point, David made the key discovery of a set of photographs of the coast, made by archaeologists studying the French Shore of Newfoundland. 

Despite Newfoundland’s status as a British Crown possession, the French had been fishing cod in this area since the early 1500s. In 1713 England enshrined French fishing rights in the Treaty of Utrecht, a sort of Great Powers grand bargain that ended a troublesome European war. The French kept on fishing there until the early 1900s (both supporting and angering the locals), when a different spate of bargaining led the French to trade away the fish for their African colonies.

The French used a system of “fishing rooms” for processing and drying their catch, built on safe landing zones next to reliable sources of water. What David had found was, in effect, a kayak camping guide to the area, courtesy of 19th century French fishermen!

I found a set of GPS coordinates in the appendix of an academic paper for the fishing rooms and water sources, and turned these into a layer of colored dots on our charts. (We used topographic rather than marine charts. Most of the water was deep, there were no navigation marks, and our wayfinding would be based largely on land contours.) We cross checked these sites with the coastal photos from the archaeologists, satellite imagery, and information from local people. It was clear that even if not every dot was reliable, nearly all of them corresponded to usable beaches, streams, and so on. Those French fishermen gave us a lot more confidence in our options.

Crossing to “The Rock”

With great sadness, we all missed David’s presence as we boarded the ferry. In the end, after all the planning and anticipation, he had been unable to join us. A couple of weeks before our departure, David came down with an entirely unexpected medical condition. Although he recovered the better part of his health very quickly, he and his medical team and his family realized that a long, arduous kayak camping trip in a remote area was not in the cards this time.

The Marine Atlantic ferry to Newfoundland is a very well-run and comfortable affair indeed if you book an overnight cabin, and if the sailing is not canceled by bad weather. The beds are small but comfortable and the showers quite heavenly. Drive on the boat in the evening, sleep, get coffee, drive off the boat in the morning. And then, in our case, drive another full day to get from southwest NL to northeast NL. (Newfoundland has about the same land area as Tennessee and is similarly elongated.)

We had some minor concern about one of us having just caught a cold, but there was little to be done about that. As our next bout of driving began, though, I got an unsettling text from my wife: she had just tested positive for Covid-19, and was feeling very sick. We had a new question to resolve: would I become too ill to continue the trip, and would I communicate Covid to the others? Janet had a couple of tests but we probably needed a few more, which we picked up along with fresh groceries in Corner Brook. (Spoiler: I never did test positive. I merely caught the same annoying cold that almost everyone else on the trip came down with. Perhaps one coronavirus canceled out the other one?)

In the meantime, we continued driving to our Monday night destination, the Mayflower Inn, in Roddickton NL, a half-hour’s drive from our put-in in Englee. We passed through many different areas: high forested mountains, bays and fjords, windswept coastal plains, mountains again. The weather brightened and warmed; in one of the few notable insect incidents, blackflies attacked Janet at a random gas station in the middle of nowhere. The highway became a two-lane road, then became a two-lane road with potholes. Far from any house, locals’ fenced-off vegetable gardens appeared on the cleared roadside margins.

Arriving in Roddickton in the late afternoon, we walked around the town before getting a meal at an excellent local diner called the Lumberjack. Roddickton is the self-declared “Moose Capital of the World”—and in fairness, we did see a big moose on the drive into town. Our home for the evening was the Mayflower Inn, a very clean and comfortable motel-style operation with some detached cabins. It was calm, warm and sunny; our hostess told us this was the first nice day they had seen since the beginning of June. A fox trotted in front of us as we walked.

Day 1: Englee to Upper Chimney Cove

Your Iceberg Is Waiting

Our plan the next morning was to meet our shuttle drivers at 9:30 at the Barr’d Island Trailhead in Englee. The trailhead is (as the name suggests) a gravel bar connecting an island with the main land, so we could launch off either side based on conditions. Conditions seemed benign though. The forecast was for southwest winds, 10-20 knots. This forecast became something of a running joke on the trip because it was the predicted—and actual—wind on every single day of the trip, except the last.

We all wondered how long it would be before we spotted our first ice chunk. But as we descended the steep hill into Englee, we caught a glimpse of the ocean with a large iceberg floating close to shore. And right at the put-in beach we could see two more icebergs floating in the entrance to Canada Bay just south of town. So, there would be no suspense: plenty of icebergs to go around for everyone!

Our very friendly shuttle drivers turned up and we chatted with them as we packed 8+ days of supplies into our boats. This was perhaps one of the longest conversations so far with local people, and throughout the journey the warmth and generosity of Newfoundlanders was incredible. They all spent plenty of time on the water and gave us a number of observations and tips for the route ahead that were to prove very useful.

We launched around 10 am into Englee Harbor and promptly rounded the point into our first northeasterly run down the coast. There was a light breeze, some small wind waves and blue skies. Uninterrupted rocks and cliffs were to our left, deep water under us, distant bergs to our right. No boats or houses were visible. 

The air temperature was about 60 F. The ocean, on the other hand, was somewhere in the neighborhood of 42-45 F. An SUV-sized “bergy bit” floated next to us. We were in the domain of the Labrador Current, which brings a stream of frigid water southwards from Greenland. Now that we were paddling in it, we could see that not only is this water very cold (it hurt to trail my hand in it), but it is very, very transparent and has an intense greenish blue jewel-like hue very different from our home waters. It is also less salty, and smells different. These nutrient-rich waters originally nourished the cod that is now gone from these shores.

 

Offshore from us, we saw a lobster boat against the backdrop of the Grey Islands. At least, we were sure it was a lobster boat… until proximity revealed it to be an ice sculpture, faithfully imitating a lobster boat. The “ice boat” was to follow us for several days, visible from different perspectives as we paddled and it drifted.

The End Of All This

Around 1 pm, some 5 nm into our day, we arrived at our first reasonable stopping point: Boutitou. This name is a phonetic rendering of the French phrase “bout de tout”, roughly meaning “the end of all this”. (It is marked on the map as “Hilliers Harbour” but, in a naming dysfunction we saw repeated over and over again, local people use an entirely different set of place names. Search and rescue operations involving non-local personnel are plagued with miscommunications.)

The obvious place to land was in front of two homes beside a running stream in a protected corner of the cove. One house featured a man working on the roof, alone. He didn’t return our greeting which at first we thought was a bad sign, but then he came down and conversed with us in a friendly way. He was trying to get the roof repair done for his brother on the first day of good weather for a very long time.

This had been a potential Day 1 camping spot for us, but the human presence made us feel that we would be in the way, and the houses lent the place a slightly gloomy air. We ate our lunch on the rocks in front of the stream outlet, and moved on. On the way out, we actually found a much nicer and more private beach landing on the opposite side of the cove, to the right of a substantial waterfall pouring into the cove.

South Upper Chimney Cove

Going onwards, we began to see whales playing offshore from us. It was hard to see details but the occasional dorsal fin or tail was plainly visible. Our next planned camping spot would be opposite the tiny town of Conche, some 9 nm distant. We headed up there, hoping we might find something workable that was closer and more secluded. The uninterrupted cliffs and rock slopes continued to our left. After an hour, in search of a pee break, Phil led us on a 3/4 left turn into a small cove that looked as though it might just barely offer a sketchy landing. In truth, it was not sketchy at all: we saw a tiny protected pocket beach ahead, located past a rocky slot just wide enough for 2 kayaks. Above it, a little grassy meadow. Next to it, a somewhat flat area of boulders and small ponds interspersed with more grass. We had found our camping spot in Upper Chimney Cove, a place that did not look at all promising during the planning process, but which turned out to be perfect, and was there when we needed it.

The sky shifted back and forth between blue and gray. It was breezy and cool. Bugs were not as bad as some of us had feared at this site. We ate our dinner together by the boats, hiked on the rocks and game trails, hung up our gear on boulders, and I stayed up to watch the offshore whale-and-iceberg show in the golden light. It was a lonely and atmospheric spot. True darkness was around 11:30 NDT (1.5 hours later than EDT). Way before it got dark, we hit our tents to sleep through our first night in the wild.

Day 2: Upper Chimney Cove to Point Dos De Cheval

The Tide Always Runs South

In the morning, it was gray and cool and rainy. Our miracle slot looked less miraculous in the falling tide, with low due at 8:30 am. The slot was blocked by a wide chunk of ledge. But there was just enough leeway to work boats around it one at a time, staying careful of the drain and flood from swells, and get in from a shallow spot on the other side.

The tidal range in this area is tiny by comparison with home: somewhere between 3 and 5 feet. But big enough to make a difference in landing or launching mechanics. Tidal currents were usually not much of an issue here, but the oceanic Labrador Current does have a pronounced effect as it runs continuously in a southward direction, somewhere between 0.5 and 1 knots. Although the sun and the moon have nothing to do with it, the local fishermen refer to this ocean current as "tide", saying, “The tide always runs south here”.

More Whales, Bigger Ice Cubes

We moved on to Chimney Cove, the next cove north, where the largest iceberg we had seen so far nestled in the southwest corner. We circled it, some warily, others seeming unconcerned. (Later our concern was to increase, after a berg decided to grace us with an interactive safety lecture.) The colors, shape and texture were stunning, the blue shades much more brilliant than we expected.

The weather steadily improved as we went. This was a common theme on the trip: mornings were often socked in, with clearer weather coming in the afternoon, if it came at all.

We were approaching Conche Harbor. Originally our plan had been to visit the town by kayak and change into regular clothing to visit its local museum, but the group amended it in favor of visiting by car later on in the trip. Instead, we would visit the enormous tabular berg on the other side of the harbor, a rectangular monster the size of multiple city blocks with vertical faces of 50 feet or more. (Scale was hard to grasp without approaching closely, something we declined to do.)

Whales were also playing near this berg, with some humpbacks displaying their tails against the backdrop of the ice face. As the group watched the show, I scoped out a lunch beach with its own private sea stack. We landed on the beach for a scenic lunch, looking out at spouting whales and the huge berg. The town of Conche lay concealed by a headland, just to our north.

Off to one side of the berg was a field of smaller ice chunks, no doubt ones which had fallen off from the main berg. Jason pointed out that they were audibly fizzing as they released tiny air bubbles, frozen into the glacial ice tens of thousands of years ago under immense pressure.

Carboniferous Conche

Proceeding from the berg, we rounded Cape Fox to enter a completely different world altogether: the world of the Conche Peninsula. Together with the Cape Rouge Peninsula just to its north, it consists of younger, reddish sedimentary rocks from the Carboniferous era, their layers canted at a strange angle and eroded into many fantastic high headlands, caves and dramatic pocket beaches. This landscape is totally unlike the much older gray Precambrian rocks on the main shore of Newfoundland, which seem to be much more resistant to erosion. These sedimentary rocks are apparently related to those of Appalachia; indeed, there are coal seams and oil seeps in them, and the nearby Long Range Mountains are essentially an extension of the Appalachian Range.

This area was a visual and paddling feast. Some of us went into one of the most spectacular sea caves to check it out. It was calm and protected inside, with aquamarine jewel-water around us and a clear view of the bottom. Psychedelic buttresses and towers loomed nearby. This one had a skylight-type feature at the rear of the cave which on the headland appears as an opening in the ground, locally referred to as a “glass hole” because one can see the ocean through it from above. To us, it was a window into the sky above.

We passed an enormous roosting cliff of what Phil said were kittiwakes.

I hoped the cape would go on forever, but after an hour of paddling and gawking and a pee stop, we rounded the north side of it. The rock fantasia was replaced by hills sloping down to a pebbly beach: an old French fishing room, Point Dos de Cheval. The air suddenly became warm and moist as a strong southwest land breeze hit us. After fighting our way upwind briefly, we attained our next campsite.

The archaeological record showed water nearby, and we found it after a short hike along the shore. We had been advised that we would not lack for water, and indeed we found usable streams near almost every site we camped at (with water treatment still highly advisable). Many of the streams were brown with tannins.

We lounged and rested on the beach. Most of us camped just above the strand line; the upland meadows were overgrown with stinging nettles in places. There was a continuing interplay at this site between freaky hot and cold winds that kept changing moment by moment. Odd refraction effects played over the waters of Crouse Harbor, named as a corruption of “Cap Rouge”. Houses in nearby Northwest Crouse, a deserted outport, were visible across the harbor. That area is inhabited now by local people using the homes as vacation camps, but we opted to maintain our solitude and remain on the point. Late in the day the wind died to nothing on the point, but we could see wind waves further out.

Day 3: Point Dos De Cheval to Kearney Cove

The Drinking Elephant

Thursday morning was like many of our mornings in NL: patchy fog, patchy clouds, even more patchy sunlight. These always made for a fascinating interplay while drinking morning coffee. This morning, the swift motion of the fog made it clear that our southwest breeze would be somewhat stronger today. The exit from our harbor was alternating between clear visibility and total obscurity.

Once packed up, we headed out around the southern tip of the next peninsula, Cape Rouge. The fog blanketed many of the cliffs and features and we could see only a short distance ahead much of the time. As we rounded this point, the water roughened considerably into something like a tide race; I thought this might be wind wave energy encountering the opposing Labrador Current.

Once around the point, the wind dropped. We had a brief glimpse of a couple of large icebergs near the dramatic northern tip of the peninsula, Pyramid Point a couple of miles ahead. Then fog moved in and our view ended. We moved along the cliffs in a white shroud.

Finally, a substantial mid-sized iceberg emerged in front of us, preceded by a glow of bluish fog as if lit from within. It merited a circuit or two.

Passing Pyramid Point, we saw another berg just outside Pilier Bay. This time, biological imperatives spoke louder than the icebergs, and we turned in towards a French fishing site marked on our charts which looked like the best bathroom break available for some miles: a protected beach with a stream to replenish our dwindling water supplies. On the way, we briefly explored another amazing sea cave, this one notable for its showers of dripping fresh water and an enormous trunk-like pillar dropping into the sea from a narrow arch of land. Later, we heard that local people refer to this feature as “The Drinking Elephant”.

The bathroom break turned out to be one of the most scenic places we had stopped yet, a narrow meadow topped by a waterfall and bracketed by dramatic cliffs, overlooking Pilier Bay and completely protected from the wind.  It was declared an immediate lunch-spot success and we broke out the food. If we had needed to camp, it would have been perfect for that, too. Like many of the nicest sites, it was almost invisible from a distance, partly concealed behind a zigzags in the coastline.

Windy Point

Proceeding north, we decided to cross Pilier Bay rather than stick by the coast, since we saw that without our protected location the southwest wind was whipping across our path, stirring up some nice rollers. We preferred to have those mostly behind us, instead of hitting our bows and beams. Our next stop was planned to be in Croque Harbor, another 6 miles up the coast. To get to that campsite, we would likely have to cut across some more wind-blown water at a place named, appropriately enough, Windy Point. So we kept going up the coast. The conditions continued to increase as we crossed the last cove before Croque, with rollers coming in from the southwest on our stern quarter. They were not immediately dangerous but they suggested the entrance to the harbor on the other side of Windy Point might be a really wild place.

After a brief group conference we decided to continue to the point and see what the deal actually was. To our surprise, conditions at the harbor entrance were not at all bad. We could see the area of our destination, Kearney Cove, across water that had some whitecaps but did not look overly fierce. At any rate it made sense to us to keep going up the harbor towards our campsite and deal tactically with whatever we might encounter.

What we encountered was only slightly worse than what we’d already seen, and when the campsite suddenly revealed itself around a corner, it was a beauty: a lush, green, flat meadow clear of trees or brush, bracketed by rocky hills. It became actually hot and sunny: blackflies, for the first time on our trip, came out to greet and bite. We pulled out our bug nets for the first time. Janet made some margaritas using ice harvested from a berg. Sweet!

Hiking around the heathery hills later, Janet and I sighted an enormous iceberg offshore. Whales were visible out there, spouting and flipping their tails. I found a set of caribou antlers. But no caribou. Yet.

Day 4: Kearney Cove to Great St. Julien Harbor

Carvings From Long Ago

In the morning it was cloudy as usual and cooler, although blackflies still tried to bite us in spots. Another exercise in walking the boats out through low tide rocks awaited us. And my caribou antlers were gone, nowhere to be seen: an abiding unsolved mystery of the trip.

Our plan for the day was to paddle to a substantial harbor further up the coast, St. Julien, where we might consolidate our excellent progress by taking a day off and camping for two successive nights in the same spot. But first we wanted to head further into Croque Harbor, to view a set of French rock graffiti left by fishermen in the late 1800s.

Along the way we spotted an iceberg of medium size. This time, the group stopped for an brief impromptu discussion of safe paddling around icebergs. Opinions differed on the danger level of unstable icebergs. Some felt it was possible to tell by looking whether the iceberg was top-heavy and liable to roll. I had my doubts about this. But before I could voice those doubts, the iceberg itself spoke directly on the subject. With a roar, a house-size volume of ice cracked off of one end of the berg and plunged into the water, immediately disintegrating into living-room and grand-piano sized chunks plus many smaller pieces. It seems that nature had wanted to get in on the discussion.

The carvings were faded and obscure, but atmospheric. We could make out the names of ships: Pomone, Roland:

Names of boats and dates, and little else that we could see. In the backdrop, the now-deserted town of Croque was visible. We wanted to cover miles and did not investigate the town; we would be headed to a different abandoned outport later in the trip.

North to St. Julien Harbor

Between Croque and St. Julien the Newfoundland coastline changes character. The Grey Islands which had hovered offshore throughout our trip were now south of us, and our departure from their swell shadow gave us much more of a rhythmic up-and-down as we progressed. Paddling along the cliffs yielded enjoyable moments of harvesting the wave energy and gaining an extra speed spurt. The cliffs themselves became beautifully colored in hues of purple, green and red, contrasting with the intense blue-green of the water. Some interesting rock slots presented themselves; they would have been more enjoyable in unloaded boats. An impact here could torch the remainder of the trip.

Finally, after navigating some interesting shoals in the incoming swell, we arrived on the shore of St. Julien Island. We ate lunch in the first heavy, solid rain of the trip. It was not entirely pleasant and our surroundings felt a bit forbidding. We surveyed our situation just outside a trio of finger-like harbors. Progressing from south to north these comprised Great St. Julien, Little St. Julien and Grandois Harbors. The last of these had a mostly deserted outport, while the former two had been among the most active French fishing sites on this stretch of coast. We had a key tip from our shuttle drivers: in Great St. Julien Harbor, there was a disused hut that we could roost in if we needed shelter. We didn’t know where it was, but we figured it couldn’t be that hard to find. We set off for the “harbor”, which is actually a calm, narrow tidal estuary that looks like a river.

After a couple of false starts on beaches featuring either imaginary buildings (it was, admittedly, foggy) or overturned buildings (it must have been stormy at some point), we found a real, actual building: a small red one-story hut on stilts in reasonably sound condition. Landing at a nearby beach, Lorrie took a quick look. With the minor caveat of the door not being actually attached to its hinges and falling off when removed, the interior was fairly clean and dry with benches around the perimeter of the hut. An ordinary picnic table was the sole piece of furniture. The game was on.

As the rain intensified, so did our gratitude to this hut. We did not camp in it, but in the heavy weather it came at exactly the right moment. We looked forward to a day of rest and shelter, especially since four out of our group of five were suffering in common from our common cold.

Click to continue to Part 2 of this trip report...

Edited July 15, 2023 by Joseph Berkovitz
add link to part 2

[billvoss]

Wow!  I'm looking forward to part 2.  (I guess that experience might have been worth missing the Wednesday Lunch Paddles.)

1 hour ago, Joseph Berkovitz said:

The air temperature was about 60 F. The ocean, on the other hand, was somewhere in the neighborhood of 42-45 F.

...

Now that we were paddling in it, we could see that not only is this water very cold (it hurt to trail my hand in it), but it is very, very transparent and has an intense greenish blue jewel-like hue very different from our home waters.

You know I have to ask.  How many paddlers practiced rolling their kayak during the trip, and did anyone need a combat roll?

[EEL]

"but there was no coastal road: it would be remote enough. "  What a delightful turn of phrase conveying the essence of true adventure.

Ed Lawson

 

[Joseph Berkovitz]

@billvosssee the end of part 2 for some upside-down celebrating kayakers. At no point did anyone capsize, nor did any of us practice rolling in the cold water. Most of us had a bad cold throughout the trip.

[billvoss]

2 hours ago, Joseph Berkovitz said:

@billvosssee the end of part 2 for some upside-down celebrating kayakers. At no point did anyone capsize, nor did any of us practice rolling in the cold water. Most of us had a bad cold throughout the trip.

@Joseph BerkovitzI'm happy to see that @JanetL and @Lallenare each still my kind of kayaker. 

I'm even in such a good vicarious mood after reading your reports, that I'll accept everyone's "bad cold" doctors note as a valid excuse for not rolling in the "cold water."  Since I must admit that while I do still roll when there is ice floating in the water, I do NOT go kayaking when I have a "bad cold."  I'm glad you all had fun despite your infections.

[Joseph Berkovitz]

As much as I love rolling, there are a lot of interesting aspects of the trip; perhaps let's have another thread on the rotational aspects of Newfoundland if we want to pursue further. I'll try to respond though for others who may undertake a trip like this.

I practiced plenty before the trip including both loaded boats and winter water. I know others in the group practiced too. There were OTW discussions  during the trip about the wisdom of having assisters deal with fully loaded boats (80+ lb.) in the event of a failed roll. We had one paddler with a patched drysuit sleeve. Overall, the downside seemed greater to the group than the upside.

The bad cold is to me a more interesting question. Scratching the trip in the middle of it was certainly possible at one of the 3 road-accessible bailouts (Conche, Croque and Grandois). It would have been both expensive and heartbreaking. We chose to paddle on, and were glad we did!

Edited July 15, 2023 by Joseph Berkovitz

[Ricardo Caivano]

Loved the first part Joe! Don't make us wait too long. 

R