I particularly love Americans travelling in Canada.
But more than any other tourists on the planet I just adore the Americans travelling in Newfoundland.
And there are a lot more than usual this year. So I get a chance to talk to many of them.
Like tonight. I treated myself to a dinner of plate sized (I exaggerate a little!) scallops in my favourite restaurant in a gorgeous town called Holyrood and shared a smile and a hello with some lilting Deep-South accented Americans at the table across from me.
Later I go for a long walk on the magnificent boardwalk with the Wonder Dog and on the way back meet them again as they take in the beautiful evening air and the sunset over the ocean.
They are missing their dogs terribly, they tell me, even though they have a person dog-sitting them, right in their own home. He especially is lonesome for them, as he communicates on an almost mystical level with dogs as he demonstrated with mine.
So they happily played with Ansa and it turns out they are from Winston Salem in North Carolina and two hours later we finish our conversation.
It encompassed archaeology (they had been on some digs), health care, climate change and, yes, politics. To hear their heartbreak over the last eight years of the mismanagement of their country and their barely expressed ‘hope’ for ‘change’ would make a stone weep.
But more than anything it was the personal details of our lives that bonded us: beloved granddaughters, rescue dogs, a dream of getting off the grid, driving smaller cars, foreign movies and we truly touched souls when we shared our stories of having one troubled daughter out there in the world estranged from family, both with the same name co-incidentally. It eased the pain for the three of us, just sharing that very personal information. And we said this.
And we parted like family. Hugging.
I truly love travelling-in-Newfoundland-Americans.
