Gros Morne, Newfoundland

August 9th began with the heaviest rains dumped on us all trip. We tore down the tent from the inside out, applied our rainwear and set out for the top of the hill. The climb was long and tiresome, and brought us our first taste of the tuckamore; twisted and stunted, super-dense though patchy forests of spruce/fir/balsam that are impassable save for narrow game trails, wide streams, and (my favorite) boulder-fields. Thankfully, the path up the side of the mountain is a reasonably-well-defined ‘primitive’ trail.


Upward bound, navigating the tuck'.


Everything was always damp. The NFLD way of life, I suppose.


The tour boat doing its thang.


Views from about two-thirds the way up.


Head in the clouds.

Near the top of the climb is a boulder which demarcates the beginning of the descent for any weary hikers travelling in the reverse direction. We stopped there for lunch after considering the options now that the trail had run its course and fog/clouds were playing peekaboo with our landmarks.

This was no place to be navigating under reduced visibility, a point driven home by the park staff, though it was also no place to be setting up camp. And so we broke out the GPS, the park-supplied route map, and input the next waypoint. We maneuvered from waypoint to waypoint as best we could around, through, and over each thicket of tuckamore until the fog began to lift. Although never far beneath the cloudy ceiling, we were gifted visibility after an hour or so and were able to route-find by sight across the vast swaths of open tundra.


Into the unknown. Like creepers.


Never far from the Western Brook Pond gorge.


Eventual visibility. Not that there were a whole lot of landmarks to see.


Pushing through the tuckamore.


Surveying the next route through the forests of tuck'.

Atop the plateau, bakeapples – a sort of berry – sprouted by the hundreds. Not much to my liking, but they provided the other two with a plethora of mobile snacks.


Bakeapples, A.K.A. cloudberries, among a number of other names.


Rock-studded, pot-holed tundra.


A boulder super-highway. Quickest way through the tuckamore. I'll never take glacial deposits for granite again.


Spare tent pad kitchen.


Home for the night. Although this was taken the next morning.

Whereas the first half of the day had been dominated by climbing, the second half had been dominated by what the park staff referred to as the Tuckamore Tangle. The worst we would see of the impenetrable vegetation throughout both traverses. And as cautioned by a tuckamore-experienced hiker at the orientation only two days prior, our pace did slow to approximately 1km/hr. Nevertheless, after a day that started with heavy rain, leading to high hills, and eventually ending with the grasping wrecks of trees tugging at any part of us they could grip we arrived at our second campsite with another 8ish kilometers behind us.


I'm pretty happy to be there.

We awoke on August 11th to find our views replaced with a white blanket of cloud complete with intermittent periods of light, misty precipitation. By the time we had finished breakfast, the other campers had long vanished into the fog.

We looked up at the climb before us and started down the trail. The precipitation had subsided leaving waterlogged vegetation and slick rock-slab slopes for us to contend with. One such location had the moss and underbrush stripped away from our position straight down to the lake, the telltale sign of an unlucky moose taking an unintentional dip.

By the time we emerged at the top of the pass from the thick brush beneath we had been soaked through. However, with another pass-climb behind us we found ourselves staring at a wonderful sight. The ridge that separates the Northern Traverse from the Long Range Traverse. Situated above the end of the Western Brook Pond gorge, the ridge offers incredible views of the pond and its gorge. With renewed vigor, we set off down the back side of the pass and made our way across the soggy alpine tundra. I climbed the steep ridge at double-pace anxious to take in the grand view and, for once, found myself ahead of the other two. Once at the top we stopped for a long break and a group photo to celebrate the completion of the Northern Traverse – what we were told would be the hardest and most demanding leg of the entire trip.


The finish line ridge is the one just right of center.


Our swarming friends never left us once until we found the ridge's winds.


The classic view. I mean with the others in tow for once.


Tour boat making its way to the end of the pond. It did not stop to drop off any hikers. I still wonder if anyone on the boat, perhaps with a long enough lens, happened to spot us up there.


Obligatory group photo.

From there onward our pace quickened, accelerated by the easy hiking along the bare rock ridges and well beaten game (and likely hiker) trails. Given the lack of major elevation gain, the views through this area were not as spectacular as the Northern Traverse. We made good time to our originally planned third-night campsite and sat for lunch. We decided on a 4:00pm cut off for the following campsite, the one we were originally intending to skip on this day: if we arrived before, we would continue on to our originally planned fourth-night campsite; if we arrived after, we would stop for the night and all but guarantee the need for our extra day. We negotiated the barren and soggy Long Range Traverse with relative ease, taking care not to follow game trails too far off-route, navigating by map and sight more than GPS, and making good time to boot. By the time we settled down into the ultimatum campsite it was only 3:15pm and thus our settlement would only be a rest.


Pictured: Easier hiking. Not pictured: Much tuckamore.


This was clearly the more well-traveled route.


Mid-August and still snow-packed in some places. I would refer to these as Gros Morne glaciers for the remainder of the trip.

Our originally planned fourth-night campsite was now our goal and we were itching to get back on schedule. The descent from a high pass down towards the campsite’s lake brought into a view a large cabin with two large boats. Odd to see such a place so far removed from any reasonable access (though there are many lakes atop the plateau, the watercourses connecting them are not particularly conducive to boating). I figure it must be a ranger’s station.


Awfully nice place for a ranger.


Candid shot of me trying to figure out why there's a cabin spoiling my unspoiled wilderness.

We rolled into camp after more than 12 kilometers and collapsed onto the nearest tent pad. Another pair of hikers on the next tent pad over – all of 10 feet away – chuckled and offered us some warm naan bread (which we devoured without hesitation). The menu that night was a traditional Newfie dish: salted cod. I passed on the cod and simply enjoyed the side dishes. I also attempted to bathe, but the lake was only about 8" deep for up to 500m out (according to the other couple there) so the bathing became targeted splashing at best. Sleep came easily that night.

August 13th, our final trail day, started as most days had: threateningly overcast. We had a long day ahead of us, not only because we were to finish the trek, but also because we intended to climb Gros Morne mountain. Though campsite to Kia was approximately 13 kilometers without the added distance and elevation gain of the mountain, we once again found the hiking to be easy.


And our (read: my) spirits lifted, in no small part thanks to this fella.


Ten Mile Pond gorge finally shows itself.


Gros Morne mountain finally shows itself, just ahead of those two.


I spy with my little camera some folk checking out the top of the mountain.

So easy that we had unintentionally cruised beyond the proper game path off the ridge – deemed the safest route down to the pass – and found ourselves contenting with another dubious descent. Grasping at vegetation and making generous use of our bottoms, we eventually stumbled back onto the clearly defined route and were well on our way to meeting up with the mountain descent trail.


I spy with my little camera a group of people descend from the Gros Morne mountain.


Working our way down to the mountain trail on the pass between the plateau and the mountain.

The proper day-route up the mountain has folk climbing a scree filled gash in the southern face and then traversing across the broad, flat top before descending down a heavily improved trail on the north side (it has stairs!). Given our position on the day-trail – most of the way up the descent route – we ditched our packs in the bush and climbed up the improved north-side trail, stopping to talk with many groups who were curious as to why we were going at it backwards. Tourists ‘from away’ didn’t appear to quite understand what these Northern and Long Range traverses were all about, but the local folk seemed to genuinely enjoy hearing about our escapade on the Northern Traverse route.


I was even last up the stairs.

The top of the mountain offers vast views in all directions with particularly brilliant views up and down Ten Mile Pond’s gorge. Though a seemingly inhospitable pile of loose scree, some rock ptarmigans with chicks flittered about the summit area.


Ten Mile Pond gorge and out to sea.


Dropping back down to the pass to begin making our way out.


The trail makes great use of the scree to avoid the tuckamore. Too bad my hiking buds didn't much care for scree.

The drop back down the north face was fast and forthright. We hitched our packs and meandered a little ways down to the hike-in camping area at the southern end of the Ferry Gulch pond to break for lunch. After that, it was a matter of simply following the day trail as it wound around the Gros Morne mountain, across its scree slopes, and down into the lush forest beneath it. Two of us, egged onward by the promise of moose pizza, raced out the final 4 kilometers from the base of the mountain to the parking lot. Before long we were once again in sight of our plucky Kia.


Given the choice between tuckamore and scree, I'm thinking even wet-behind-the-ears hikers will choose the scree.


One last view (of the seaside cliffs) before dropping into the lush forest.


The hiking got significantly easier.


The south side of Gros Morne mountain showing the scree-filled gash that constitutes the normal way up. It's hard to imagine, but people had their young children up there (not including the 100% uphill 4km trek to get to this point).


Reunited at last.

Pizza, beer, and sleep ensued.


Quidi Vidi and moose pizza, a true Newfie meal.


And some quality Newfie tunes to boot.

"Cod kissing"? I'm guessing that ritual has an interesting background?

The photo of the tour boat dwarfed by the massive cliffs is quite impressive.

In the "south side of Gros Morne mountain" photo, there are some orangish spots - are they berries? I noticed some orange "growth" in an earlier photo as well.

The moose was magnificent, hoof raised as if he was prancing for show. Quite a beautiful animal.

All in all, quite beautiful, stunning, and dramatic photos of a similarly described landscape, coupled with stark contrasts and very rugged terrain. The "rock highway" was stunning; I'm sure your ankles got a good workout traversing that area.

Thanks for the time you spent sharing your experiences.

I'm not entirely sure on the background and Wiki doesn't provide much of an answer. As far as anyone has been able to tell me, it's mostly so the locals can get a good-natured laugh at the expense of the mainlanders, who typically laugh at Newfies (in Canada, Newfie jokes are as prevalent as blonde jokes elsewhere).


I think in that particular photo the orange is just dead, or dying, conifer boughs. Though the berries do tend to take up tracts of land, they don't grow in close bunches, so they don't really appear as anything more than orange specks.


My alpine experience kept me pretty steady on the boulder fields, but the other two were not fans. The one who injured themselves (ankle) did so on similarly rocky terrain.

Thanks for reading :-)


Thanks :-) It's fairly verbose and photo-dense, so I'm glad to see a couple people stuck it out to the end.

Excellent story! Sounds better than kick in the head with a frozen boot.