7/22/04

Position:
51-44.332 N
56-26.225 W

At anchor again, Red Bay, Labrador

This is probably the northern most extent of the trip (lots of easting still to do yet, though).  I crossed the Strait of Belle Isle to the Labrador shore this morning, and the next leg will probably take me back around the north tip of Newfoundland to St. Anthony.  There is a dock here, but it is too exposed and the more protect anchorage further up the bay is much more comfortable, even if Polarlys does have to get dinghied to shore. 

There is a Canadian government sponsored group of marine archeologists here that is diving on a 17th century Basque wreck.  Many wrecks here.  Hmm.

I also met a fellow here who is paid by the Canadian government to help conduct a sector by sector survey for loose discarded fishing nets.  It seems they have this theory that there are unattended rogue fishing nets that have escaped the bonds of the fishermen and are "self-fishing",  Thus, the reason there are no fish anymore is because these phantom nets are going around scooping up all the fish.  The government hires people (out of work fisherman no doubt) to methodically trawl the fishing grounds to catch the run-away nets, and then tabulate all the fish in them.  Nothing's come up so far, but stay tuned this could be big.