Flight of Fancy

Newfoundland certainly likes to hide its light under a bushel. 

Amazing attractions are not really promoted or sign posted here. You just have to know about them yourself and then have faith that there will be something at the end of the road, perhaps be a tiny, ancient, sign with paint peeling off it to indicate you are in the general neighbourhood of what you are looking for.

For example, Amelia Earhart’s solo flight, as the first woman in the world to fly across the Atlantic, took off from Newfoundland. This was an extraordinary achievement, especially in 1932. May 20th to be exact.

You might imagine this happened from one of Newfoundland’s major airports. But no! In the character of an Ealing Comedy film, the tiny town of Harbour Grace was chosen as the site for the takeoff and the whole town turned out to cut a runway from the forest near the ocean. The runway still exists. 

But to find this landmark runway, one must be alert enough to see a tiny blue and white signs (of which there are only two or three) sending you up a little road. 

This road narrows, then becomes a gravel road that snakes and winds up around the small town of Harbour Grace, past fields, under a highway, between ponds and streams, and still on and on - by this time you are wondering where you are - until suddenly you come to the end of the road at a farmers gate with a sign. 

Is this really it? We walk through the gate and find ourselves standing at the top of a long grassy field at the top of a hill, with a wall of rock on one end and a gentle slope several hundred metres downhill. 

We can see at one end there is a plaque, a series of signposts showing the destinations of multiple historic flights in the 1920s and 1930s that took off from Harbour Grace,- and that’s it. No entrance fee, no gift shop, no interpretive centre about Amelia or about the many other historic flights this little patch of grass has served. Just us and the wind.

This place looks exactly like it must have done in 1932. Time has stood still. The grass on the runway is ready for the next flight. Amelia could be getting ready to take off. Horses were and still are let loose on the runway to keep the grass down. That's the only technology here.

Back in Harbour Grace, along the side of the road into town, there is a small statue off to the side, next to a vintage local cargo plane. We see a few faded yellow roses strewn near Amelia's feet, where members of the Ninety-Nines, the International Organization of Women Pilots, recently came from away to Harbour Grace to pay homage to the 90th anniversary of that flight, just a few days ago. At least someone else was also able to find that airfield!  

As it was:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wno39E7pwAg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zb74J3UfMsE