Ride Day 10--St Anthony, bus to Deer Lake

Day 10/RT 28— Sunday July 11
St Lunaire to St Anthony to Deer Lake
Bike 20/ bus 260 mi

Tour Guide Description: Our last day. It is on to St. Anthony, and the end of our tour. Today we take arranged transportation back to Deer Lake. Note: The transportation from our end point of cycling at St. Anthony back to Deer Lake is included with your registration. It leaves St. Anthony early in the morning and arrives in Deer Lake in late afternoon. We manage to get a few hours of cycling in before departure.


The night before, Suz, Joanne, and I chose to ride in the van to St Anthony. It was—as usual—pouring rain and we saw only another rainy 20 miles. Also, Suz was saddle sore and ready to be done with cycling.

Marshall with camp stoves set up outside the motel so that riders could prepare their breakfasts

My bike and Suz's wait to be loaded for the hop to St Anthony

Piling the gear to be loaded; notice that half of the rental truck is taken with shelves for food boxes and the rest is clutter. When the time comes, Gary will cram all of the gear and bikes into this small truck--all but mine and Suz's bikes, which I rescue and place lovingly in the back of the shuttle bus

Ironically the day dawned fog free and sunny! One of a very few such on the ride. After helping get the luggage organized, we rode with Andrew in the van. Andrew dropped us off at St Anthony’s Fox Point where the bus was to arrive at 10 o’clock. None of the buildings were open when we arrived, but we took pix of the Lighthouse, Viking Feast Dinner Theater Longhouse, and the area.

Barry of the BUNS at the Viking dinner theater

Flags before the Viking Feast Dinner Theater

Front of  Viking dinner theater tourist attraction

Dinner theater as it looks facing the inlet

Eventually, as we were standing on a boardwalk lookout seeing a whale in the distance, a ranger came over and told us of a fox family that lived about midway up the dozens of steps to the top of the point. I would have loved to climb to the top, but my feet are prohibiting me from doing much walking. I must check into correcting my tendonitis and nerve problems when I get home. It is too restricting, even dictating that I wear ugly open heeled Crocs and my inserts most of the time. Also causes me to lose sleep because of my tingling, burning lower legs.



The many steps up to a lookout point; we were told of a fox family that entertains visitors about half way up where the foxes have taken up residence

Claude's photo of a fox that was scrounging like a dog for food near the road

We went up in the lighthouse while waiting for the riders to arrive and also walked a short piece of boardwalk “trail.” One by one the other riders arrived but they had no place to change out of their riding clothes until a general store/tourist shop opened around 9 or 9:30.

Joanne at the top  of the lighthouse

Path leading to a lookout where we watched for whales

A little boat taking some passengers on a  whale watch

St Anthony

The road along  the bay and up to Fox Point where I am looking back on St Anthony and taking the photo

Then the Budget truck arrived with all the gear, and then the van arrived with more gear. Everything was removed from the van and then it was loaded with Aki’s baggage. She and Andrew took off for the Deer Lake airport about 11:30 just after our bus departed. They had to race to get to Deer Lake in time for Aki’s 6 pm flight.

Andrew feigning being blown off the ground by the wind; it was fierce; he didn't have to fake it much

The shuttle bus we will take back to Deer Lake

Andrew later reported that he fairly flew along, passing our bus while still on the tundra. A moose came to the side of the road as they flew past but—thankfully—turned and went back into the woods.

"Moose/vehicle collisions kill on average two people in NL each year—had already killed two by July 2010—July and August seeing the most collisions. More than 10,000 accidents occur each year in Newfoundland as a result of a motor vehicle hitting a moose or hitting another object in an attempt to avoid a moose. Despite warning signs for motorists where these accidents tend to happen, many occur each year, as 150,000 moose make the province their home" (Internet). And, lest you forgot, the moose is an introduced species. Read about this bizzare moose/motorist collision.

The Budget truck has shelving on either side to hold camping and biking gear and cyclists’ food bins. Luggage is stacked between the shelves. When the truck arrived, all of the baggage was off-loaded onto a large tarp. I helped Ed and Gary with this operation while Andrew emptied the van. Then the smaller bags were loaded into the back of the shuttle bus, which had arrived. Gary placed the larger pieces of luggage on the floor of the Budget truck and stacked bikes on top of them, doing this secretively in the back behind a hanging tarp. When I looked in to see what Gary was doing, Ed said, “You definitely do not want to see this,” and went on to tell me of how frantic and unorganized Gary gets at this stage. Behind the tarp, Gary was disassembling and stacking everyone’s expensive bikes, helter skelter, asking for small pieces of luggage to cram between them.

Eventually we had sorted out most of the luggage (had to wait on many bags because riders had not had a chance to get to them and pull out clean clothes), and Gary assessed the remaining space. Told Ed and me, who were helping him load, that he had room for 13 more bikes. There were 23 still leaning against the truck. At this juncture, I told Ed that two bikes would fit in the shuttle bus’s back luggage compartment standing side by side. How about if I loaded Suz’s and my bikes onto the bus? Yes!

Momentarily stymied by the number of unloaded bikes—and not wanting the riders to see how he loaded them—Gary quit loading the remaining 21 bikes until the bus, with all riders on it, had pulled away. I can only imagine the manner in which the bikes were transported. When we got to Deer Lake, Gary considerately backed the truck to the back of the parking lot and strung another tarp across the doorway so that riders did not have to suffer unduly on sight of their $3000 machines disassembled and crammed together helter skelter.

On a pitstop on the way back to Deer Lake, we met this man who had walked across country from Vancouver and was on his way to St John's on the southeast tip of NL.