Saturday, 3 August 2013

George Street Festival

We left Cape Spear early Saturday morning so we could find a good parking space in St. John’s. We had been told to go early because every available space would be taken as the day progressed. Fortunately, we found a space on the wharf, two blocks from George Street.

While on Cape Spear, we saw this odd looking ship steam into the harbor, wondering what it was. Turns out we parked right next to it. The ship was the MS Turanor Planetsolar, the world’s largest solar boat. Between 2010 and 2012, it had sailed around the world powered exclusively by solar power! In conjunction with the University of Geneva, it is currently involved in doing climate change research by studying the ocean currents. The ship has 5,556 sq. ft. of photovoltaic cells (29,160 solar panel cells.) A really interesting ship.

The George Street Festival is the biggest festival of the year in St. John’s. It is four days of music and beer! It is (obviously?) held on George Street, which is only about two blocks long. We chose to attend on Saturday since several of our favorite bands were playing then. They have kind of a strange requirement. Seems that once you enter the area, you can’t leave. This would not be too restrictive except we entered at 2:00p and did not leave until 11:00p! Again, we were told if one does not enter early, there would be no place to sit. During music festivals, almost all Newfoundlanders stand! My ole body would not be able to stand for 9 hours so we chose to get there early. One of the best things for us was seeing Newfoundlanders (and others) of all generations having a good time and enjoying their traditional music.

It was quite an enjoyable, if not long, evening. Great music!