LOCALadk Magazine

Fall 2020 LOCALadk Magazine 25 LOCALadk a relatively small "bergy bit," but we all still gasped in awe as we approached it. In hindsight, the wr y smile that Paul flashed in this moment hinted that he knew that this was only the proverbial tip of the iceberg, and that much grand- er sites awaited us. Sure enough, after another 5 minutes of motoring along the rugged coast and admiring the seabirds nestled within the cliffs, a ghostly phantom appeared ever so faintly on the horizon, like a ship about to disappear out of sight. As we drew closer, it was apparent that this was no ship, but rather a truly massive iceberg that easily towered 50 feet above sea level. The level of excitement that we all shared at this moment is rivaled perhaps only by children on Christmas morning, and will forever be one of the most magical and memorable moments of my life. I took photo after photo as we circled around the iceberg, and I eventually put my cam- era down to simply stare in awe at a site that most people will never see in their lifetime. We saw several other icebergs on our first Zodiac tour, and on our second tour we were treated to significantly dif- ferent weather conditions and enjoyed a cloudless sky and bright sunshine. It was fascinating to see how drastically some of the smaller icebergs had changed in less than 24 hours, as some of them had broken apart into smaller chunks that floated and clinked together like ice cubes in the cup of God. The brilliant sun afforded some different photo op- portunities than the previous day had, and I was especially intrigued by the way the submerged portion of the smaller icebergs glowed a brilliant turquoise-green. I would highly recommend that anyone traveling to Quirpon Island for pho- tography spend multiple days on the island and get out on the Zodiac each day to take advantage of the ever-changing conditions of both the weather and the icebergs themselves. After returning to the island after our second Zodiac tour, we enjoyed our last evening on the island out in the sunshine scanning the horizon for whales while drinking screech rum on iceberg ice that had been plucked from the ocean in the morning. A convergence of ocean currents at Quirpon Is- land make it the best place to see whales in Newfoundland, and while we were a little early for the peak season, during which, we were told, sometimes hundreds of whales can be seen around the island, we were able to spot a couple of humpbacks gliding by the rocky shore. The mood and the weather on this final evening could not have been more different from when we first arrived on the island. We could now laugh about our struggles on that first day, and we all came to the conclusion that even with the challenges that come with traveling to a place like Quirpon Island, this was the greatest adventure that we had ever gone on together, an adventure we'll be reminiscing about for the rest of our days, to a place that permeates the soul and will make you start plan- ning a return trip before you've even left.

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