Staying on, on Fogo Island

The wedding of Amanda to Jason went off very well.
After the actual service, there is a vehicle parade around town, horns honking wildly. Along the roadside small groups of men gather at intervals, firing off their grandfathers powder muskets in celebration. These old guns are often over five feet long, and the booming report bounces around the bay.
Pete, father of the bride, is undoubtably the most dashing man in town this day - in a tuxedo suit, raising the long barrel into the sky and firing a sonic boom salute.
We have decorated a Stage for their honeymoon night.
A Stage is a building traditionally used to land codfish, from the skiffs, and split them, ready for salting.
The Stage we have transformed is one Zita had rebuilt where her fathers' used to be, so it's only fragrance is of fresh wood and saltwater.
As the evening darkness draws on, the party is just beginning. At around midnight it's low tide so Karen and I heat up some large flat beach rocks and then lug them over the seaweed strewn rocks out to the Stage where they will warm the bed. We've decorated the Stage with voluminous fabrics hung over the bed - which is adorned with a beautiful quilt - cloths and rugs on the floor, armchairs, candles, Champagne, chocolates and on and on.
If the sun shines in the morning, throwing open the big front doors will reveal a vista across the bay and out to sea. We devised a series of coloured signalling flags for the morning - yellow for 'send coffee', orange for 'breakfast', and blue for 'rescue us'.
It's past three before the designated rower is called upon to row the couple out to the Stage for their nuptials.
Poached lobster and bacon for breakfast.

This morning, mid June, there were bergy bits in the tickle.
Small chunks of melting iceberg, over 10,000 years old, about as big as a punt, bobbing about in the narrow channel.
A thin fog hesitantly hovers on the hillsides. The sea is still and grey.
Fogo Island is about 21 miles long, by 14 miles wide, with a population of about 2300 people, spread between ten fishing communities.
We cruise around it in our own gleaming iceberg.
Where the thin soil has accumulated, gardens are being planted, the caribou kept at bay by rustic stick fences.
It's the kind of place where people don't lock their doors, and you're welcome to drop in for tea, even if they aren't home.

Talking of which, Karen is now home for July. But only for July. So give her a call.
We have decided to stay in Newfoundland as long as possible, which means one of us had to return home for July to take care of business. Then we will both spend August here, and return home in September, probably via Sooze's birthday bash at the incredible City Museum in St. Louis, Missouri.
Here on Fogo Island there are many formative arts & crafts projects we can help move forwards, and the daughter of a friend is about to open a Cafe - the first ever here in Joe Batt's Arm - so there is much we can assist with.
We have decided to offer our help, in any way we can, in a 'summer of service'.

Julie, friend and fabulous ceramicist, from Guemes Island, Washington State, and just down the road from us at home, is also here for the summer and beyond. She is working on creating the planets' largest codfish mural in a tile mosaic.

On a sunny day the rocky coastline, with its red and white buildings, looks like the most beautiful place on earth.
Newfoundland is such a wildly rugged, and beautiful place, and the people are so welcoming.
About every three days, there is a day when the light is so amazing everywhere you look, that it can take all day
just to cross the Island.

Yesterday was the Student Punt Launch - a punt built by students mentored by a Master Boat Builder, which went very well. The weather was bright and squinty, but windy, and there was a good crowd down at the old longliner shipyard site in Shoal Bay for the races.

Lobster season is over now, but the limited, personal fishery, for cod, is about to start.
People are awaiting, with great anticipation and relief, the arrival of several good days in a row. It was a difficult and long winter with many terrible storms that lasted for days. Now the newly planted vegetables need a drier, sunny, period.

I've listed below a few websites that will give you a broader picture of Fogo Island, and the summer ahead.
Or just get on a plane and come on out here!

www.fogoislandregatta.com

www.fogoisland.net

www.shorefast.org