Amélie hikes the East Coast Trail – DAY 36

TORBAY: LITTLE BEACH TO LITTLE GALLOWS COVE 

Starting out from “downtown Torbay,” Father Troy’s Trail is one of the most “civilized” sections of the East Coast Trail. It’s more of a “nature trail” than a “wilderness trail.” Walking through long-abandoned pastures and alongside current cow pastures, the long-standing human occupation and transformation of this landscape is immediately obvious. What’s more, most of this section of the trail is shared with ATVs and snowmobiles, which, on this terrain, makes for very easy walking.

HOWEVER.

Easy walking depends on good footwear.

And Amélie definitely wasn’t wearing the best boots today. Though we had two of her best pairs of boots with us in the car, Amélie insisted that she wanted to wear the pair pink rain boots she’d recently inherited from her cousin. She wears these quite a bit around the house and to run errands, so we figured that they’d be just as good as her other hiking footwear. Well… these didn’t work out so well. A few hundred metres in, one of the boots came off her foot and she fell. Then it happened again. And again. Half a size too big and not as rigid as her other rain boots, these slowed her down very significantly. She dragged her feet the whole way.

We certainly were glad to have discovered the problem in such an easy trail instead of having to face it in a trail like the hellishly mucky Island Meadow Path linking Renews to Cappahayden we hiked yesterday!

An unexpected surprise was waiting for us at the wharf at Tappers Cove. A beautiful mural celebrating the life of the wharf adorns the breakwater, and playfully hidden throughout are little trickster fairies. We played at spotting them with Amélie, who wondered out loud about what they were doing there. At the foot of the stairs is a little fairy dragging a large sac behind him. We of course suggested that he might be the one leaving treats for her on this trail.

 

 AMÉLIE’S PROGRESS

 

Related posts:

 

Amélie’s total progress: 93km/316km

Distance walked by the adults today: 4km

Total distance walked by the adults: 178.2km

One thought on “Amélie hikes the East Coast Trail – DAY 36

  • I hiked that part of the East Coast Trail on my first visit to Newfoundland. Stayed at a lovely B&B in Pouch Cove and walked with the owner’s dog towards Flat Rock. Flat Rock became my very favorite spot on the trail. You will discover the majesty of it when you get there. Happy Trails dear precious ones. Je vous aime et me réjouis de ce merveilleux pèlerinage que vous faites en famille. XXxx

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