Down and Down to Big Broad Cove Beach

Wednesday, August 30 was to become rainy in the afternoon, so we hustled down to Calvert, Newfoundland, south on the Avalon Peninsula from where we are camped in Tors Cove.  Kathy was hoping to hunt for sea glass on Calvert's town beach, as well as on Big Broad Cove Beach, which is difficult to access.  We started with Big Broad Cove Beach:

 

 

Broad Cove is on the north side of Calvert Bay, across from Ferryland Head, where we had hiked to a Lighthouse Picnic the other day.  As we headed toward the cliff over the beach, we got a view out toward Ferryland Head:

 

 

Kathy's research indicated we would have to descend to the beach using a rope strung down the cliff -- and whoever reported that was not kidding!  Here is Kathy starting her nerve-wracking descent:

 

 

We made it down the rope to the beach without incident.  Looking back up, we wondered if it would be harder climbing back up.  Oh, well, we were down on the beach, so we might as well complete our exploration before finding out.

 

 

The beach was stony, with narrow bands of gravel between the stones high on the beach and the waves lapping against it.  The cliffs along the beach -- except where we had descended -- were jagged rock:

 

 

It did not prove to be a very productive beach for sea glass, but David scored two errant boat bumpers, which must have been washed up on the beach in some recent storm:

Kathy could put her discoveries (the sea glass) in her pockets, but David could not do the same.  So he knotted the ropes attached to the bumpers and insisted that both he and Kathy loop the rope over their shoulders, wearing the bumpers like backpacks, as we climbed back up the rope to our trailhead.

It turned out that the climb up from the beach was easier than the descent, so we ascended without incident, hopped back in our Jeep, and got to our campground before the rains did.

It stormed for two straight days, so you can expect our next blog entry to be in a day or two.