Brightly colored homes in Newfoundland, Canada
My theory regarding brightly colored homes seems to still hold true. European towns with long, cold winters have the most brightly painted houses. These brightly colored homes were a common sight in St. Johns NL, Newfoundland-Labrador, Canada. Most every home and business in this town followed this tradition. Islands seem to have more subtle pastels.
With such a neat and tidy appearing home, it would seem like they would pull their one single weed.
By now we had a fairly standard routine for exploring the port towns visited. Instead of going on the long, extended bus tours, we explore the town at our leisure, picking out a lunch spot, wandering about and working our way back to the ship. Any ethnic food appeals to us, from Ethiopian to Indian, we enjoy it all. It is not like Newfoundland is famous for their particular style of food…
Being a travel photographer I do not get to wait around for good light from a photography viewpoint, I have to accept what I get. All of these colors would appear even brighter in more subdued light.
Planter boxes with nasturtiums.
Saint Pierre and Miquelon France
Our next stop was France? Oddly enough, Saint Pierre and Miquelon, France is a vestige of the once vast holdings of France. They tell me it is a ‘territorial collective’ of France vs. just a ‘territory’ or an ‘autonomous territory’ or a ‘commonwealth.’ The good news is I’m not going to spend time learning exactly the differences between these little understood variations, we are now simply back in France. It was raining so hard the Seabourn captain wanted to call off this port visit. Apparently the residents of Saint Pierre had done lots of preparations and still wanted our cruise ship to come. It kept on raining.
Cruising in the Fog
That night we learned when a ship travels in the fog it must sound the very loud foghorn every two minutes … all through the night and into the next day. This was a big storm. It never let up during our stay. Once we stopped we no longer had to sound the foghorn. What a relief. However, we could then hear a foghorn approaching us from behind, getting louder and louder, but could not see anything.
A passing tanker sounding the foghorn.
As we approached the village, the fog was beginning to lift and we got a glimpse of the town.
Brightly painted homes could be seen through the fog.
On less windy, rainy days, fishermen might be out trying to catch fish for seafood loving tourists like me.
Yet another Brightly Colored Town
As we got off the boat there was a man playing lively tunes on an accordion, in the rain and wind. I can’t describe it, but could this guy look any more French?
Frenchman playing the accordion in the rain.
It was not only raining, but a strong wind made the umbrellas unusable. Still, I walked around the town looking for something to photograph. There are only so many colorful windows one can look at, or take photos of. So I’ll show them to you in triptych format. It will go faster that way.
Lace curtains and more bright colors.
I think a triptych of hinges or windows would look very good blown up over a couch or above a bed.
On to Montreal, Canada.
We had several additional stops in Canada and finally arrived in Montreal, the end of our cruise journey. Remember in the first blog of this trip, back in Portugal, I promised to not post any more photos of churches until we got to Montreal.
Hallelujah, the storm clouds began to clear.
We visited the Basilique Notre Dame De Montreal, and what a church it is. The construction of this church began in 1824 with numerous revisions and major improvements since.
It is often quite dark inside churches, making photography difficult. The below shot is a single photo taken at a wide 16mm, 1/60th second and a very high ISO of 12800. The camera is tilted up slightly to cut out the many ‘Instagramers’ standing in line for irritating selfies.
The beautiful sanctuary alter piece.
The massive 7,000 pipe organ. This photo is the result of three separate images with different exposures manually blended together.
This massive organ was upgraded during the 100th anniversary of the basilique. Pipes now range in size from 1/4 inch to 32 feet in height.
Gotta go now as we are headed to the Montreal Chinatown, searching for authentic steamed soup dumplings.
Next blog stop? Boston and surrounding area.
Very colorful and insightful.
I wish my HOA would allow various house colors versus a dull drab grey vinyl siding.
Thank you for the early morning views to go along with a nice cup of coffee.
Knowing you get up early on a Sunday and see my blog with a cup-o-jo is the reason I publish very late on a Saturday night. Thank you for your continued interest in my travels. Good luck in you HOA….
Is a fog horn as bad as a train whistle? I remember once in middle school, cross country we were running by the train tracks and a train came, the whistle shook the ground. That must not be fun to be on. Maybe the colorful houses are to help see them in the fog as well as make a cheerier atmosphere?
I’m certain about the more cheerful atmosphere. Thank you for looking.
Cool triptychs. I like the first window that frame, color and lace curtain make a nice photo.
My father lived in Montreal for some time and we visited him and my favorite step mother there. I vaguely remember the Basilique Notre Dame De Montreal thank you for the memory jog.
Margie took quite a few pics of Montreal and Quebec City. I do not know whether she kept any of them in digital but we have some prints.
So very much enjoying your photography and travels!! Thank you for sharing .
I’m happy you find the time to look at my blog and photos.
Looks like they use leftover paints on their boats.
I enjoy your images and fun writing style. It’s a nice way to share your adventures with others.
I love brightly painted houses too. I tried to find them when we were in the Caribbean last week but sadly not as many as I hoped for. Thanks for the blog post, Harold!
Bonnie and Dave
I hope your trip was a success… but I know it was a distant second place to what you are used to. Thank you again for reading. Soon I hope to have a Costa Rica blog on humming birds, frogs and bats…