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Fogo Island is undergoing an interesting experiment spearheaded by the Shorefast Foundation, which is trying to promote the social, cultural and economic regeneration of the area. From the development of a new inn slated to open in 2012 to new artist studios dotted around the island, Fogo has suddenly been put on the radar as a place where new things are happening. So we decided to have a look at the artist studios through a tour put on by the Fogo Island Arts Corporation .

We were blessed with sunny skies as we left the Paradise Bed and Breakfast in Twillingate on Wednesday August 24 and headed for the 11:15 am ferry at Farewell enroute for Fogo Island. On Fogo we had wanted to do some hiking and also find out more about the new artists’ studios that are being built there. From our research, we knew  the community of Fogo has good hiking trails. We started with a Fogo classic- the hike to the top of Brimstone Head.

Our last visit to Twillingate and Fogo Island was in the fall of 2010 and we wanted to return to find out about the hiking trail development in Twillingate and to walk some of the many trails of Fogo Island that we had heard about. So at midday on Tuesday August 23 we headed out from Corner Brook to central Newfoundland. We also had some friends from Ontario in tow and they were very keen to revisit this area having seen it over 10 years ago on a driving tour of the province.

Fleur de Lys is located at the very northern tip of the Baie Verte Peninsula in Central Newfoundland and we were impressed with the hiking that it had to offer as well as the unique Dorset Paleoeskimo Soapstone quarry that has been discovered there.

We were finishing our pea soup and dumplings when we could hear some accordion and guitar music coming from the “kitchen” of The Outport Museum and Tea Room in La Scie. The cook and waitress, Valerie Whalen said they were going to play some music in the “kitchen” of the museum and would we like to join them. “Sounds perfect to us” we chimed in, so we joined a handful of other visitors for an impromptu kitchen party.

On July 26 – give or take a day or two, depending on weather conditions – about a dozen two-person teams will take the helms of small wooden boats called punts and row 10 miles across open ocean off Newfoundland, Canada.

We recently had a chance to visit the excellent Conne River powwow over the July 1 long weekend in the Coast of Bays region of Newfoundland. This area is accessed by highway 360 which is near Grand Falls in Central Newfoundland. We had never been to this part of the province before so we were keen to see as much as we could in the couple of days that we had available....

We had never been to the Coast of Bays along the south coast of Newfoundland so when we heard about the Conne River Powwow we thought that we should make a point of visiting this year....

This past Saturday, Ronan, Cormac my Dad and I went to Sandy Cove on the Eastport Peninsula to see if the capelin were rolling. We were in luck!

Pope’s Point in Badger, central Newfoundland, bears archeological evidence of nearly every culture that has ever inhabited the island: Maritime Archaic Indian, Groswater and Dorset Palaeoeskimo, Recent Indian, Beothuk and Mi’kmaq artifacts and features have either been recovered or historically recorded to have existed there at one time.

We innocently asked our waitress at the Tuckamore Lodge in Main Brook, Newfoundland, where we might get some good photos of moose after dinner. "Well you won't need to go too far. I would simply head back on the road you just came in on and drive a few kilometres back toward Roddickton."