St. John’s , Newfoundland

Tuesday 14 September
1:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.

Protected by a narrow, rocky entrance, St. John’s harbor may seem like a quaint island village, but it is actually a modern city with plenty of cultural attractions. This vibrant port city is a nice contrast to some of the more rural outlying areas, and offers plenty of amenities for travelers and locals alike. Visit Signal Hill, the city’s premier landmark, which boasts an impressive view of the harbor and a wonderful castle to explore.

Link to a fantastic large waterfront picture.

Saint John’s webcams

Not to be confused with Saint John, New Brunswick. St. John’s is the provincial capital of Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada and located on the eastern tip of the Avalon Peninsula on the island of Newfoundland.

Note: Saint John (New Brunswick) is always spelled out, just like that. It’s never abbreviated as St. John. That’s to keep mail aimed for St. John's in Newfoundland from ending up here, and vice versa.

St. John’s is the most easterly point in North America and closest point of land to Europe. Due to it strategic location, St. John’s has been vitally important for centuries to explorers, adventurers, merchants, soldiers, pirates, and all manner of seafarers, who provided the foundation for this thriving modern day city. St. John’s is utilized as a home port for cruise ships on a variety of itineraries that cruise Newfoundland and Labrador, and as a port of call for vessels on North Atlantic, Transatlantic, and Canada New England routes.

This easternmost Canadian province comprises two main parts: the island of Newfoundland off the country’s eastern coast, and Labrador on the mainland to the northwest of the island. Newfoundland is roughly triangular, with each side being approximately 400 km (250 mi).

Labrador is the easternmost part of the Canadian Shield, a vast area of ancient metamorphic rock comprising much of northeastern North America. Colliding tectonic plates have shaped much of the geology of Newfoundland. Gros Morne National Park has a reputation as an outstanding example of tectonics at work. The Long Range Mountains on Newfoundland’s west coast are the northeasternmost extension of the Appalachian Mountains.

Saint John’s is the capital of a province called “Newfoundland and Labrador.– Newfoundland is an island that was a separate British colony until 1949 when it joined confederation with Canada. There is no province called “Newfoundland”anymore. It became the tenth province to enter the Canadian Confederation on 31 March 1949, named simply as Newfoundland. Since 1964, the province’s government has referred to itself as the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador, and on 6 December 2001, an amendment was made to the Constitution of Canada to change the province’s official name to Newfoundland and Labrador. In day-to-day conversation, however, Canadians generally still refer to the province itself as Newfoundland and to the region on the Canadian mainland as Labrador.

Newfoundland is the fourth largest island in North America and it is the most distinctive and interesting among other islands. Labrador which is located on the mainland northeast of Quebec and the northern parts of the island are part of the Laurentian Shield. It is one of the earliest geological formations on earth. The interior portion of the island is well forested while the southern coastal plain is barren and rugged.

While the name Newfoundland is derived from English as “New Found Land” (a translation from the Latin Terra Nova), Labrador comes from Portuguese lavrador, a title meaning “landholder/ploughman” held by Portuguese explorer of the region João Fernandes Lavrador.

Most residents of this province live along the Avalon Peninsula. This area is rich with history and breathtaking coastal scenery. Conception Bay is lined with small communities and fishing villages. Argentina on the southwest portion of the peninsula is where the ferry crosses to Nova Scotia. Saint John’s is the capital city of the province and the most easterly city in Canada. This warm and friendly place is also the oldest city in North America Rising from the water front, stairs, steep streets, alleys and hills wind through pastel colored clapboard houses. There are many churches in town including the Basilica of Saint John the Baptist which was built in 1855 and it dominates the city with its Gothic façade.

The best view of St. John’s is from Signal Hill National Historic Park. At the top of the hill the Cabot Tower honors John Cabot arrival in 1497. This is also the tower where Marconi received the first wireless transatlantic message in 1901 sent from Cornwall in England.

The last half of the 20th century has seen St. John’s, with a long and prosperous history in the fishery industry, transformed into a modern export and service centre, famed for its nightlife and rich musical culture. More recently, its proximity to recently discovered oil fields has led to an economic boom that has spurred population growth, commercial development and has resulted in the St. John’s area now accounting for about half of the province’s economic output.

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Newfoundlanders are known for their distinctive manner of speech. Believe it or not, they speak a dialect (that’s right, not an accent). Its roots (while still North American English) are mainly Irish, English and French, and the language has evolved and developed in semi-isolation for about 500 years. The Dictionary of Newfoundland English is about the size of a standard English dictionary. It is immediately noticeable to most visitors, or “Come-From-Aways” as they are occasionally called, that the syntax and grammar varies slightly. As for the accent, it varies from district to district in the province. As Canadian author Douglas Coupland puts it in Souvenir of Canada, Newfoundlanders “speak in a dialect that can rival Navajo for indecipherability – that is, when they really ham it up… ”

Newfoundlanders pronounce Newfoundland to rhyme with ‘understand,’ placing emphasis on -LAND, not New or found-. It sounds something like “newfin-LAND.” Canadians outside of the Atlantic provinces (therefore, discluding Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia as well as Newfoundland) and tourists are noted for their pronunciation of Newfoundland as “new-FOUND-lind,” “NEW-fin-lind,” or “NEW-found-lind.”

While in Newfoundland, particularly St. John’s, do try to sample some of the candy and sweets from Purity Factories, an island fixture for many years and makers of several traditional-style confections. For many Newfoundlanders, Christmas would not be the same without a bottle of Purity Syrup, and breakfast without some of their partridgeberry and apple jam wouldn't be right. (Note: Partridgeberries in Newfoundland are referred to in many other places as “lingonberries.”)