Backpack and Snorkel Travel Guide for the Great Northern Peninsula of Newfoundland - Newfoundland Purple Travel Guide
The Great Northern Peninsula of Newfoundland has the earliest undisputed site of pre-Columbian settlement of Europeans in the Americas. We provide detailed information and a self-guided tour with the best things to see and we show lots of photos so you know what you can expect.
It is a 4:30h drive from Gros Morne National Park to St. Anthony near the northernmost end of Newfoundland, so check out of your hotel early.
1 = Rocky Harbour
1 = L'Anse aux Meadows
Below is the climate that you can expect on your trip to St. Anthony in Newfoundland:
Table of contents
Where to stay in St. Anthony
St. Anthony is the biggest town in the Great Northern Peninsula of Newfoundland. The population is slightly below 2,200 and falling since its peak of 3,180 people in 1986.
L'Anse aux Meadows
L'Anse aux Meadows is the only undisputed site of pre-Columbian settlement of Europeans in the Americas.
Using various dating methods, the year 1021 appears to be when the site was first settled. L’Anse aux Meadows appears to have served as a base camp for the Norse to explore this areas and sites farther south for 20 or maybe even up to 100 years.
At that time, the area was covered by forests instead of the open, grassy lands that you see today.
Remains of eight buildings (dwellings and workshops), constructed with sod over a wood frame, and more than 800 Norse objects were unearthed, but no burials. This is seen as an orderly decision to when the site was eventually abandoned.
At the time, when the Norse landed here, the area was uninhabited.
But there is evidence that five Indigenous groups occupied the site with the oldest dating back to about 6,000 years ago.
The Dorset people occupied the site about 300 years before the Norse.
There are two main theories where the name L'Anse aux Meadows comes from.
- One theory is that L'Anse aux Meadows is a corruption of the French name L'Anse aux Méduses = Jellyfish Cove.
- Another theory is that it is a corruption of the French L'Anse à la Médée (Medea Cove), which is found on an 1862 French naval chart.
Regardless if it is Medea or Medusa, the switch to Meadows may have happened, because there were many meadows in this area and people may have reinterpreted the name to the more familiar, and similar sounding, meadows.
This concludes your tour for today.
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