Originally Posted by AlanInDC

Hi Folks. Many thanks for the advice about Newfoundland. Here are a few notes FWIW.

YYT is a nice little airport. Note that most services are before security and that this airport does not have U.S. preclearance. Actually, my YYT-EWR flight is the only one that I saw to the U.S. There is a Maple Leaf Lounge—seemed pretty similar to a United Club as far as the physical layout and food and drink offered (this was morning, so just basic breakfast offerings).

I stayed at Murray Premises hotel at the harbor. The room was nice, but it was pretty dead there. I thought there would be more shops and such. And it wasn’t so quaint. If I were to return, I would stay at the Sheraton if I stayed at a large-ish hotel.

Had a couple of very good meals on Water Street at Aqua and Oliver’s Restaurant. Not surprisingly, there are a number of Irish offerings, but was a little surprised to see a number of Asian restaurants – Chinese (not surprising), Japanese, Korean, Indian, South Asia.

The highlights for me in the downtown area were The Rooms (a museum complex worth a couple of hours) and Signal Hill with the Marconi exhibit that a previous poster mentioned. Went to a few galleries and just walked around a lot. The grounds of Government House are pretty and well-kept and worth a look. Railway Museum was educational about the history of the railroad in Newfoundland.

Picked up a rental car and went to Cape Spear. This is another highlight, even the drive out there to the easterly-most part of North America. The remoteness (though not that far from downtown St. John’s) and views are memorable.

I made a number of stops including Brigus (cute little town), the Conception Bay Museum, and the cable museum at Heart’s Content. As I do some tech policy work, I especially appreciated the cable museum (the first transatlantic cable terminated in North America at Heart’s Content and necessitated multiple attempts to lay the cable before success). Stayed at the quaint and delightful George B&B in Dildo. If I did this again, I would have stayed in Dildo for 2 nights and used it as a base to explore this area.

Had back luck on Labour Day. More things are closed in Newfoundland than in the U.S. For example, nearly all stores are closed. I had planned to do a fair bit of driving and go to outdoor places such as Cape St. Mary’s. However, had really bad weather with cloudy skies and light rain but worse, major fog, even at noontime in Placentia, so figured it wasn’t worth even going down to Cape St. Mary’s. The locals were all quite pessimistic that the fog would burn off down there at all.

On the weather front, the worst day occurred at the beginning—rainy, windy, and highs only to 55F (at most). I wore two coats that day, but I was in St. John’s so could do primarily indoor things such as The Rooms.

The last night was at the Fairfield Inn to make a quick drive to the airport in the morning. This part of St. John’s is (sub)urban sprawl and close to the Avalon Mall. But it served its purpose.

Flight back to Newark was in United business class. Breakfast was surprisingly bad, even for United. Plain cereal, packaged fruit cocktail, and container of yogurt. No fresh fruit or pastry.

Immigration and customs were a record for me at EWR. Used the new kiosks and had only carry-on luggage. No queue at all. I may have made it out in 5 minutes total.