Apsey Brook

The Scariest Thing in the Woods

Newfoundland is lucky in both our variety of wildlife and our lack of wildlife at the same time.  Being an island, a lot of mainland species aren’t, or at least weren’t present on the island till introduced.  The common squirrel (ie: a rat with a furry tail) was totally unknown to me growing up and I think I saw my first one in the early 80’s.  I also never saw a snake, porcupine, deer, or skunk till I visited the mainland.

Yet we do have a variety of animals, some very large, some quite small.  Random Island was at one time over populated with moose.  I remember one drive to work at the Holiday Inn in Clarenville, I saw 19. I also remember a bike road home at about 10 or 11 pm, and having to drive one out of the road near Cooper’s Brook on the Apsey Brook road. I hear bears are getting pretty common too now, and while they were there when I grew up, I only saw one.  We had a few caribou, but again only saw one of those.

Smaller than these we had tons of mink, otters, beaver, muskrats, and even the teensy shrew.  Yet none of these gave us a scare when walking in the woods, except in rare instances, we left each other alone.

But there was one thing, one not so large thing, that would send your heart to racing, and make you jump about 50 feet when you encountered it.  Yes, there was nothing any more frightening than when you flushed a snipe.  These little birds were so well camouflaged you could nearly step on them, and when you did, they flew up in your face, making a sound like all the banshees of hell had been released.

Beware the snipe!

May 7, 2013 by Uncategorized 1

The Barbecue Pipe

We’ve been cooking over coals back home as long as I can remember. Bonfires on the beach weren’t the same unless you threw a few potatoes on the coals.

Barbecuing was a relatively new thing when I was a kid, but became popular fast.  I think the first one I saw used was the old table top Hibachi.  Then everyone had the old orange one with the tripod legs.  You’d see this in pretty much everyone’s yard or on their step, and it remains pretty popular even now.

Dad worked at the Department of Highways and had access to a few old discarded items.  Once corrugated steel pipes started to replace the old concrete ones, those old ones were discarded.  Dad claimed a huge one as you can see here.  I have no idea how he got it home.  I remember we rolled it up around the back of the house.  The thing was huge, its opening was about 3 feet in diameter.

This became our barbecue.  Dad drilled holes in it about half way down, and inserted some long bolts.  On these he rested a flat circular piece of iron.  On top of this we filled it to about 3/4 full with sand.  Our charcoal went on top of this.  I don’t recall what we had for a grill, it may have even been an old oven grate, but many many MANY meals were cooked over that.

Our house was a congregating place, and it wasn’t unusual to see Eric, Barry, Bernard, Elvis, Derek, Rod, and many more from time to time a

Our old back door (BBQ just to right of pine with chair behind)

ll over at once, and everyone bringing their own meats, dogs, burgers, fish, and whatever else, and cooking up one huge scoff.

Mom would make salads, keep us going in plates and things to drink, and clean up after us.  Dad would help her, and us, and be a part of everything.  I’m not sure how they had the energy to keep up with a houseful day after day but they did, and am thankful for it.  That old pipe cooked up a lot of meals for us, and represented a lot of companionship.  Food was and is more than a meal back home, its a tradition of sharing what little we had, and spreading the food, and the joy, fun and love of family around.

May 5, 2013 by Uncategorized 0

Brannistickles in Friggin’s Cove

About a mile or so down past Apsey Brook, the brook from Friggin’s (Fagan’s) Cove Pond and the steadies runs out to the ocean in Smith’s Sound.  Years past, before even my advanced time, the Phillips family had a saw mill down here and you can still see remnants of old slabs, and sawdust grown over by grass to this day.

It was also a very nice spot to come ashore for a family outing, as on the sand bar you can see in the picture, wild mussels would grow.  We’d pick some of these, often huge ones, with shells as big as your fist, though the sand bar would shift some years and we’d be left with smaller ones as they regrew.  Once picked, we’d put them in a boiler and cook them on a coleman stove.   Of course back then, a coleman stove also involved adding naphtha (which we usually called white gas) and pumping it up for pressure, not the easy propane ones we get now.

While they were cooking, us kids would play around the beach, trying to catch trout in the brook, but having much more luck with brannistickles (sticklebacks).  We’d take a piggin from the boat, and lay it in the shallow pools, and the brannistickles would swim in to investigate.  We’d play games with them for a while, and then let them go again, careful not to stab ourselves on their spines.

Bill March at Friggin's Cove Rattle

Bill March at Friggin’s Cove Rattle

Walking in the brook, there’d be a couple deeper pools where you could indeed catch a trout, and we’d do that sometimes.  But Newfoundlanders are practical folks generally, and what we catch we like to eat, and brook trout, with their pasty white flesh aren’t very good eating.  Up from the deepest pool was the rattle, and it was sight to see and a sound to be heard in spring with the winter run off gushing down the slick rocks.  We’d climb up so far, and lay around, but it was pretty slippery and I at least never attempted to climb all the way up.

Trekking back to the beach, we’d find our steaming pot of mussels, and devour them, careful of sand and pearls that you don’t find in today’s cultivated mussels.  Some families kept hen’s and for those, they’d gather mussel shells here as well to take back and crush for grist for their hens.

Back in the boat, we’d head back for home, perhaps trying to jig a cod on the way, but satiated with a wonderful feast, cooked in their own ocean water, and with the fresh salt ocean air to stimulate our senses.

April 28, 2013 by Uncategorized 3

Turpentine Engines

 

I feel somewhat like Ronnie Corbett telling this story, as it reminds me of the part on The Two Ronnies when he would tell a joke while sitting in an arm chair, and take forever, rambling to many stories and jokes along the way, before getting to the punch line.  This story, while not really funny, will ramble the same way.

Random Island apparently had many pine trees in times past, at least so I’ve been told. But near home at least I think I only remember one still being around in my memory. Most of the forest in back of Apsey Brook was fir and spruce, mixed with lesser juniper (larch, but the common name was juniper), birch and maple.

Fir trees have blisters of resin, or myrrh, or as most of us called it, turpentine.  This was annoying when handling as it was sticky as hell, and could squirt inadvertently into your eye.  Gloves were a must for handling it.  It could be very useful as an emergency bandage when you cut yourself though, forming a seal to stop any bleeding.  Spruce trees also leaked resin, but without the bladders.  It would often harden into knobs on the tree, which we called frankum.  Dad would cut these off, and skim off the overgrown bark, and chew it like gum.  I’ve tried it, and while I’ll never like it, after some chewing you could have something that resembled gum in texture, if not taste.

Like most rural areas of Newfoundland, there were a couple saw mills in Apsey Brook, one mainly used by my family, Dad, Uncle Hay and Uncle Luther.  As a kid, Saturdays were often spent down on the beach near the mill while Dad and family sawed fir logs into lumber.  Of course that led to an abundance of fir around the mill, with lots of little bladders for a kid to break and get into a mess with.

One of the by-products of sawing lumber were millstrips.  These were produced rarely on purpose, when needed as spacers, but more often as left overs from the sawing process.  They were thin strips of wood, usually less than an inch thick, and the mill yard usually had tons of them.  We’d use them sometimes as splits, others as spacers when storing wood to allow air to circulate, or sometimes, just garbage.

As a kid though, on those summer Saturdays, one of the past time was to take a portion of a millstrip and play with it in the brook or sound as a boat, tying a string to it, pulling around.

Tying this whole long rambling post together now, one of the neatest things to do with a millstrip, was to take it and break several turpentine blisters from the fir logs on one end, and then release in the brook or even better a standing pool of water.  The turpentine would release its oils into the water, leaving that familiar prismatic color effect, and also drive it forward like a little engine, amusing this little kid at least for hours.

April 19, 2013 by Uncategorized 5

Peace, Serenity, and Put Put

Waking up and looking out over the waters of Smith’s Sound, you can really believe you can hear the world breathing. Its so still, the blue sky and blue water, serenity. Then you hear the unmistakable sound that gave an engine its nick name, put put put goes an old Atlantic Make and Break engine.  I know there was another manufacturer as well, but all I can remember now is people talking about a 2 Atlantic when referring to these.  They were staples of the Newfoundland fishing industry for probably 70 or more years.

Most people whose livelihood came from the fishery had one of these equipped in their main fishing boat.  Nowadays people seem to keep their speedboats at a wharf or pier, but back then and probably still for some, a fisherman kept his boat off shore a ways on a collar.  I can only assume it was to prevent damage from storms or high winds, but I really don’t know the reason.  People kept a flat (a flat bottom boat) or a dory or rodney to get out to their main boat.  I can’t really do a collar justice, but its basically a wooden contraption anchored to bottom by a grapnel, which you could moor your boat to.  Here’s a link to the Dictionary of Newfoundland English definition.

Another unique thing to see related to this was seeing the old timers using a sculling oar to make their way out to the collar.  Someone skilled with such an oar could really make a rodney move!  A sculling oar is similar to other boat oars, but longer, with a handle, and a slightly different blade.  A skilled user could manipulate this oar as both a propellor and a rudder and steer and propel a boat.  I’ve tried it some in the past myself, and while I could make it work a little, its quite a talent or art.  I’ll never forget how quickly Uncle Lionel Kelly could make his rodney fly across the water.

Its a Tuesday evening here now, but in my mind its an early Saturday morning, and you can hear a loon cry across the water, a make and break put putting down the sound, and the quiet splash of water dripping from a sculling oar as Uncle Lionel makes his way to his collar as the early morning vapor rises over the sheet of glass that is Smith’s Sound.

April 16, 2013 by Uncategorized 0

The Old Outhouse
All that remains of Uncle Hay's old outhouse. Thanks Eric Cooper

All that remains of Uncle Hay’s old outhouse. Thanks Eric Cooper

Last night the rain was coming down, making a soothing noise, but reminding me of many cabin trips where we’d have to brave the rain to use the facilities.  For some reason I was also reminded of The Red Green Show, and the poems Red used to recite.  I came up with my own poetic masterpiece to suit my mood….

It is raining.

An April rain, chilling and cold. Making a half frozen slush to shuffle through for a midnight outhouse run, where it plays a tap dance on the tin roof, then drips down the back of your neck.

It is raining.

You think I’ll have to turn down offers? In any event, the old outhouse was an integral part of growing up, and while many were rough and ready, especially those built for cabins in the woods, those people had for their living areas were surprisingly more than you’d expect, and as much as it can be, a pleasure to use.  Back home, “down on the land”, Uncle Hay had and kept up an outhouse out the path from his house.  It was a bit of a trek if you were short taken I’m sure, but as kids sometimes when you had to go, you had to go.  This outhouse was, for the genre, beautiful in my eyes.  It was well walled, well painted, had a window, and well maintained roof, and Uncle Hay kept a nice supply of toilet paper out there.

What made it even better was that he, or perhaps it was Brad and Paul, I’m not really sure, kept a supply of comics and reading material out there.  More time than necessary was spent in there keeping up with Archie and Jughead! In any event, I have fond memories of that old commode, and while its an odd topic to write about I guess, its a part of home that brings back fond memories.

April 6, 2013 by Uncategorized 2

Good Friday Trouting

Growing up back home, one of the Easter traditions was a Good Friday trouting trip.  These were sometimes a walk in the woods in back of home, or sometimes a trip in car to a roadside pond, but were often a whole family event.

The great thing about the whole trip was that you never knew from year to year what “kind” of trouting you were doing! Lots of Easter weekends it would be ice fishing, and on others you’d be fishing with a rod and reel on the shore of a completely ice free pond.

Of course one of the other memories of those days was the fact that it may not have been a rod and reel you saw people using.  A lot of people used a bamboo pole.  I’ve never actually tried it, and really haven’t seen it done in years, so now, thinking back on it, I’m a little puzzled on how people actually pulled a fish in. I assume once the hooked it, they had to pull the line in hand over hand!

The picture on the left wasn’t a Good Friday trip (at least I don’t think it was).  It was taken I believe in 1969 (making me 4 at the time) when all of my Dad’s siblings except one (Herven) had gathered together for the first time in years, and the last time too as I know I never saw Aunt Mae again.  I only have faint memories of it, but the whole family and some Aunt’s and Uncles made our way into Friggin’s (Fagan’s) Cove Pond for a family trip, so it reminds me somewhat of Good Friday fishing.

I’m not sure if the Good Friday trouting trips are as much of a tradition now as they were, I know as I got older, I always liked to go, but it became more with friends than family, but I guess that’s part of growing up.

Fishing isn’t the same in Nova Scotia for me, I don’t know where to go, and there are too many fish types to catch, and not know what to do with.  Back home we had trout and that was about it.  Still though, I think when Hayley gets a bit older, I may see if she’d like to go on a fishing trip.

Happy Easter everyone.

March 29, 2013 by Uncategorized 6

Up, Down, Out, Over the road

It may be prevalent elsewhere, but one thing Newfoundlander’s know is that distance isn’t measured in miles or kilometers, its measured in time.  How far to St. John’s? 2 hours.  Gander? Hour and a half. If you don’t do it in those times, then you’re obviously driving too slow.

One other thing we have is how we point out communities and locations on the way.  Back home, Apsey Brook was at the end of the road, so we of course had to go “up” the road to go anywhere, and everyone knew coming from that direction you were coming up.  A confusing side effect of this was that Snook’s Harbour meets at the bottom of three hills or grades, and so that portion is of course named “bottom”.  It was always amusing to see CFAs (come from aways) confusion when we said we were going up to bottom.  Of course, since the road took a 90 degree turn there, we had to go “over” to Elliott’s Cove.

Going to school was down to Hickman’s, and if we went shopping we went up to Clarenville. It all makes perfect sense, no?  Then again we also had to deal with going out the arm, out the sound, in to town, and so on and so on.  Yet we all knew which was which, and if someone got it backwards (like maybe me now, is it out to town? or in? I keep forgetting?) god help them for the fun making about to be heaped on them.

Anyway, was always fun to head up to bottom and play ball, and then run over to the store to get a snack.  If you get a chance, pick me up something while you’re over :).

March 12, 2013 by Uncategorized 0

Painting the boat

In fall of the year, we all pulled our boats up on the beach, and turned them upside down for winter.  Typically this became somewhat of a social event, as one man can’t pull a boat up by himself.  We’d put down some time washed round sticks, and some wet slippery slabs and get a few people on each side and pull it up, and then most people on one side, with a couple on the back to brace it as we’d turn it over onto some supports.  Often we’d pull up several boats at once, and a few beer would be drunk, drank, drinked, whatever the right derivation is, and a few yarns would be told.

Once spring came, preparations began to get the boat in the water again.  This involved scraping the flaked paint off, adding oakum where necessary, and repainting with marine paint.  This chore often fell to the kids of the family, and really wasn’t that hard, nor onerous so, I at least, didn’t mind it.

However paining a boat does involve one piece of knowledge that apparently for one year at least I forgot.  I took the paint and oakum down to the beach, and proceeded to scrape the boat, and give it a nice new white coat of paint.  Dad went down later that day or the next to check on my work, and came back laughing his head off.  I of course asked him what was so funny.  He said “Well you did a good job on the boat! Too bad it was Ralph’s!”

While Dad is gone now, he never let me forget that, nor will Eric I’m sure, as its his favorite story.  Maybe someday I’ll get a boat back home and Vince can return the favour!  Miss you Dad, and Ralph too!

 

March 4, 2013 by Uncategorized 2

Random Island Ghosts

In books, it seems every small town has numerous ghosts.  But I really can’t remember many ghost stories from back home growing up.  There may be many I’ve never heard, and if so would love to hear about them, so let me know!

I do have two stories of a “ghostly” nature, though how ghostly you can decide.  One remains unexplained and backed up by rumor I’ve heard, the other, well…. you’ll see.

The first story may have been a prank, I don’t know, and not sure anyone would remember the story now but me.  But back home in Apsey Brook, near the old one room school, was a shed for coal, aptly enough called the coal house.  Years after the school was no longer used for school, the coal house was still there, with its kilroy was here drawn on the wall, and small pieces of coal caught in the seams and corners.  It had sliding doors; just wood in a groove, with a hole through for a handle to pull.

Usually the main door was usually partly open, but the day in question, Keith and Lorne and I (I being the younger brother tagalong) were over near there, and the door was shut. Suddenly Lorne points at the door and says look!  We look, and, and to our (or mine anyway) surprise, and a little fear, a big eye was looking out of the hole in the closed door.  We stared for a few seconds and finally Lorne runs over and yanks the door open.  To the tune of a loud “Baaaaa” one of Jim Phillip’s sheep runs out.  Looking back now I can’t imagine anyway it got in there, so I’m going to assume the kid had a prank played on him!

The second story is mostly rumor I heard, and “common knowledge”.  How true any of it was is anyone’s guess, but I do have a small recollection that backs it up.  Uncle Ingham Smith died in 1972, and his wife Sybil eventually(maybe immediately? I don’t recall, I was only 7 :)) moved in with her son, Roy.  Their grandson Roger when he got married moved into the old house for a period before building his own in Elliott’s Cove and moving.  Rumor has it though, that the reason he moved was that Uncle Ingham was haunting the house.  Lights would go on and off, the fridge would open, footsteps would be heard.  Of course this may have been just that, rumor, but it was an interesting story.  I do have one memory though that backs it up, though perhaps faulty electrical could be the cause.  I recall one evening in particular, when no one was home in the old house, looking over across the brook and seeing the light over the door go on and off several times.

Ghosts? Perhaps a sheep got in the house as well? I don’t know, but those are the only ghost stories I know of from Random Island.  Share yours in the comments?

February 24, 2013 by Uncategorized 3

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