The second stop today is still close to Fortune but it is more of a cultural stop. We want to visit the Provincial Seamen’s Museum, quite a large museum especially for this less populated area. The building itself is quite futuristic, at least to use even though it is almost fifty years old.
It is in fact the Yugoslavian Pavillion at the 1967 World Expo, it impressed the Newfoundland Premier so much that they bought it and moved it here at the end of the Expo. It is a nice story but we are wondering if the museum is open as there are no other cars around. We try the door and yes it is so in we go pay our entrance fee and are ready to explore.
We start with the temporary photo exhibition, it is quite an interesting one with snow and desolated spaces being at the forefront something that we can understand being related to Newfoundland.
The main, permanent, exhibit is of cour related to the lives of fishermen and women in the area. There are lots and lots of boats both actual and models, they are quite interesting to see, the shapes and the sizes being quite different.
There are also exhibits about the tools of the trade and molds showing how hooks and other fishing tools were made. These are quite interesting there are lots of different anchors and fishing hooks, a lot more than we expected.
And then there are motors, lots of motors. Most of them are boat motors but also pumps and other motors used throughout the island. And then also the lobster traps, something very commonly used around the island.
Then there is a section with different objects found from ships sunk around the island. It is quite eye-opening to see the many boat names found on the shore after the boats were sunk.
There are also some objects that we need to read the description to understand how they were used. Like the really small cannon, was it to attack pygmy pirates? No it was for signalling in the fog or if the boat was in trouble quite interesting.
Then it is time to go upstairs, we had no idea the exhibit continues upstairs but it does. There is a collection of means of transport and other household utensils of the fishermen leaving here. There are bicycles, cars, and even a propeller left from plane.
Of course there are lots of horse drawn carriages meant to work in the winter, makes a lot of sense. And then there are the day to day objects like washers, TVs, cameras and everything else you can think about, quite interesting.
One of the more interesting objects is the old diver suit. We have seen this only in movies before and it is fun to see the heavy boots and the weights as well as the steampunk aesthetic of the helmet. And then it is time to move on now we have a longer drive ahead of us to the next stop for the day.
