Travelling Hopefully - Up and Down a Hill

My last full day in St Johns dawned bright and sunny so I decided to walk up to signal hill which overlooks the city.  I popped in for breakfast along the way and when I came out it was cold and overcast.  It would appear I’ve got to stop having breakfast.

Signal Hill dominates one side of St Johns harbour.  There is a squat tower at the top of it and one can imagine gun positions there controlling access to the port beyond.  Unfortunately it isn’t true.  The tower was actually built in the late nineteenth century for Queen Victora’s Golden Jubilee.  They did, however, build a fort and a gun battery about halfway up the hill for the same purpose.

When the French captured St Johns they approached the position from the landward side and when the British recaptured the place they did the same thing.  That the British, a maritime power, would be obsessed with attack by sea makes sense.  I’m not sure what the French were thinking.  As a general rule you don’t send an army by sea if they can practicably walk to their destination.

After a long and proud history of failing to defend St Johns from attack the hill gained a new claim to fame when Guglielmo Marconi climbed to the top of the hill and received the first transatlantic radio communication from a transmitter in Cornwall.  This brought Marconi rapturous applause from the political leadership in Canada and a letter from the Anglo American Cable Company threatening to sue him if he didn’t get his arse out Newfoundland right sharpish.

Now the hill poses for postcard shots and serves as a centre for a series of walking trails in the surrounding nature reserve (the area being too rough and hilly to build on).  I puffed up the road leading to the tower, to be more accurate I puffed, wheezed, retched and vomited up the road to the tower.  Along the way I paused to photograph some remarkably relaxed ducks at the charmingly named Deadmans Pool part way up.

Once at the top I paused briefly to catch my breath and vital signs before enjoying a spectacular view over the city and harbour.  There was also a man walking what appeared to be a black bear on a leash but which turned out to be one of the largest dogs I’ve ever seen.  His name was Chief and he was a sea rescue dog.  He comfortably outweighed me and I couldn’t help thinking that in an earlier age it was entirely possible he could get harpooned by accident while out on the job.

Having escaped Chief’s somewhat slobbery attentions I set out on my journey back to the city.  I had walked up the road but would be taking a hiking trail that ran along the cliff side on the way down.  The trail was noted as being of “medium to difficult” grade.  I have news for them, if I can make it without a problem (and I did) then it isn’t difficult, it probably isn’t even medium.

Still the view was impressive whatever the difficulty and I was able to get a very good understanding of why the British figured guns on Signal Hill would be a good way of defending the town.