Our Walk Along the East Coast Trail (ECT)

Beyond the East Coast Trail   “When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe.”   John Muir, My First Summer in the Sierra When we first began planning our hike along Newfoundland’s East Coast Trail , we knew that this journey was about more than completing one beautiful coastal route. It was about testing ourselves, our gear, our planning, and our ability to live, walk, document, bird, and blog from the trail day after day.   Now, having completed the East Coast Trail, we find ourselves standing at the end of one journey and the beginning of something much larger.   The East Coast Trail has been everything we hoped it would be, and far more demanding than we expected. It has given us dramatic coastal cliffs, rolling fog, cold rain, unexpected snow, strong winds, seabirds, whales, welcoming communities, muddy paths, hard lessons, and unforgettable views over the Atlantic Ocean. It has also given us the confidence to ...

East Coast Trail Hike:  A Journey in Fragments, shaped by Fog, Wind, and Wonder Few trails have taught us more about letting go of control than the East Coast Trail. We arrived on Newfoundland’s Avalon Peninsula, hoping to hike the East Coast Trail end to end in a continuous push. What we found instead was a trail shaped - and sometimes stopped — by weather, wind, and the will of the land. Our journey along this wild Atlantic coastline unfolded not as a straight line, but in scattered pieces stitched together over time - one hike at a time, and one section at a time. Even a year later, as we began our walk across Newfoundland on the T'Railway section of the Trans Canada Trail, we were reminded again: on this island, the weather decides.  A Trail That Taught Flexibility Rain, fog, and wind weren’t inconveniences - they were characters in the story. We hiked through coastal squalls, fog so thick it erased the sea, and gusts that made standing difficult on exposed cliffs. Th...

Sugarloaf Path on the East Coast Trail Important Bird Areas along the ECT We awoke early to begin our final walk along the East Coast Trail , which we think will bring the total number of kilometres we've walked to somewhere over 250 during our trip! Although the weather forecast this morning mentioned thick banks of rolling fog off the coast of the Avalon Peninsula, we decided to head out anyway. We took a taxi to the Ocean Sciences Centre , which is where the northern end of the Sugarloaf Trail is located. When we arrived we discovered that it is possible to visit the Ocean Sciences Centre, which apparently offers exhibits showing seals and other marine life. If we had known this before, we would have planned to stop by! As we climbed up the erratic strewn hillside above the parking lot in the fog, the sounds of gulls and a whale spouting in the cove below were truly magical. However, the fog was so thick we couldn't see very far at all, and at one point we go...

Hiking the Father Troy East Coast Trail Return to the ECT This morning we woke up, refreshed and thankful for the good weather forecast for today. Last night we decided to spend our final two days in Newfoundland hiking some of the East Coast Trail pathways north of St. John's. Initially, we planned to get a ride back up to Cape St. Francis and for two days push to see if we could complete our missing sections getting us back to St. John's.  However, after contacting several taxi companies the cost of getting back up to Cape. St. Francis for the day (frequently noted by each company as being over $200.00 each way) led us to revise our plans.  Instead, we opted to trek from Flatrock to St. John's with our remaining time. We had breakfast and then took a taxi up to Flatrock, where we began hiking south on Father Troy Path . As we headed away from the parking lot at the trailhead everything was obscured by dense fog. Luckily the trail was well marked, and we had no tr...