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1900 Friday August 26
This morning David and I agreed that we both were greatly enjoying our visit here at Fogo Island. This we decided to not rush ourselves and spend a second day and night here. Fogo Harbour is worth the extra time and a little exploring.
After breakfast aboard we began walking to the east end of the town, passing quaint homes, small piers and wildflowers. We had read about the Marconi Interpretation Center which is up on a ridge at that end of town and kept ambling along until we reached the old site of the Marconi wireless station that operated here in for a couple of decades around the 1920s. We spent over an hour with our guide and chatted about many topics, including the fisheries and island life today. We later popped into a few local stores and a grocery for some needed items. Then into one of the three beautiful churches here in Fogo Harbour, followed by a very late lunch of fried local cod.
Along the way we chatted with four or five other locals, getting more of a feel for life in this outport. In different seasons snow crab, sea cucumber, shrimp, cod and turbot are harvest from local waters. It ends up eing shipped all over the world; most of the sea cucumber goes to Japan as a delicacy. People on island are of varied minds about the government set quotas on the cod fishery. Some believe in it, some do not. Many of the locals are concerned about the bird flu that is killing the sea birds, and has spread to seals. Some fear it could spread to fisherman. Up this way they do hunt murres in the fall and winter; one local said that he won’t hunt murres this year due to bird flu concerns. “It will be a hard winter,” he said.
Some people expressed concern that with warming temperatures the ability to travel across the ice to mainland Newfoundland in the winter is being threated. Winter here, as in other areas of the north can be a time of travel on ice. Warming seas change that. There is more I could say about this place. However, I am opting to simply offer up a few extra photos. This place is stunning! Every turn tugs at the sleepy artistic corner of mu mind as if the island were a muse. I just learned that Andrew Sookrah, my artist friend in Toronto, has considered coming here to paint. I need to tell him to come post haste! Anyway, enjoy the photos below.
One local on the pier said we were just the sixth sailboat to visit here this summer. Off the beaten path…
Bill
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