There is definitely a North American fascination with Vikings. We think all Norsemen were the marauding, pillaging Vikings with horned helmets and double-bladed war axes that we see in movies and television shows. But a great number of them were just seafaring merchants, and those were the ones who ventured to the eastern shore of our continent looking for the resources they were lacking in Greenland. I remember seeing pictures of L’Anse aux Meadows, a UNESCO site, on CBC television shows. It looked amazing, and I hoped that someday I would get the chance to see it in person. When we decided to take a trip to Newfoundland I knew we had to make the long trip up to L’anse aux Meadows, on the northwestern tip of the island.
We started our trip to the site on the Viking Trail, the only road north out of Deer Lake. It was a long trip, almost 5 and 1/2 hours. We stopped at our B&B to check in and then went to the National Park Visitors Centre to get our tickets. We had booked into the Shadows and Sagas event where park guides in traditional Viking garb tell stories. It took place in one of the sod houses reconstructed on the site. After picking up the tickets we had some time to kill so we drove down the road as far as we could. We got out and took a look around. Then we had a quick dinner and went back to the B&B to organize our stuff before going back to the event.
It was very interesting. They fed us a hearty flatbread with partridgeberry jam and gave us partridgeberry juice to drink. The first storyteller gave us a history of Leif Eriksson and his adventures before and after his trips to this part of the world, which he called Vinland. Then another story teller told us about some of the settlers who tried to make a go of it in the new land. After a bad experience with the local peoples they decided to leave. The third story teller told us about Freydis Eiriksdotter, Leif’s half sister who also made a voyage to Vinland. She was a true Viking, if the story told about her was true. To finish off the evening, the third guide told a story very similar to Rumpelstiltskin. All three storytellers were animated and their Newfoundland accents and expressions added an extra measure of fun.
In the morning we went back and wandered around the site. It is well laid out and easy to navigate, with a boardwalk from the visitors centre to the actual site. That part of the exhibit isn’t reconstructed, but you can see where the buildings were, the indentations in the ground have been made more clear and are marked with plaques.
The longhouse had new park guides in it, with more information to impart. Everything in the building could be handled, in fact, we were encouraged to do so. With the wind blowing through the long grass and the waves crashing on the shore, and the sod covered house behind us, it was easy to imagine what they might have seen and felt. History really did seem to come alive.
Later in the day we went on a little hike that started just across the road from our B&B, called Aunt Bride’s lookout. It was a fairly easy “hike”, it wasn’t flat enough to call it a walk. The view from the top was incredible. On our way down Dale noticed a whale in the bay. We watched as it bobbed up and down several times and then breeched. It repeated this several times. We were too far away to see it clearly, but it was a majestic sight nonetheless. We ended our day with an incredible meal at The Norseman Restaurant. Dale had scallops on pork belly with pickled mangoes for his starter and I had bacalao, a thick stew made of salt cod, tomatoes and capers. Both were delicious. For our mains I had duck confit with partridgeberry sauce and Dale had lobster. We rounded out our meals with desserts. I had the citrus pound cake and Dale had the blueberry pie. It was one of the best meals we’ve had in a long time.
The following day we went to the provincial site at Norstead. It is set up as a site that might have existed had the Norse stayed in the area. It was wonderful, with more park guides dressed up, playing the parts of villagers, telling us about their lives. They had a full-sized Norse boat, a knarr named Snorri. The bay was a perfect setting.
The entire area of L’Anse aux Meadows is amazing. However, it is very remote and very wild. The cook at our B&B told us that they get over 7 feet of snow, and that winter starts in late September and runs until the end of May. A beautiful, wild and wonderful place, but for me, a great place to visit, not to live.