Corner Brook, Newfoundland – Nice chat at the coin-laundry

The naturally grown forest is so dense that you can’t even trudge through it. Every few centimetres there is a tree, and in-between undergrowth. How the voluminous moose can move here is a puzzle to me. Probably they force their way with brute violence. Firs, spruces and birch duck in a bay before the wind so that they merge into an inclined plane. There are few big trees – short summers and rough climate might not favour plant growth.

Trees and undergrowth are cut a couple of metres on both sides of the highway to keep the deer off the road respectively to give the driver a chance to see them. As we ask ourselves with which kind of device you could manage that we see them: errant work machines with a jib and an angle grinder in the end to simply shave the wood.

A moose! The inhabitants to moose ratio is said to be 5:1, but the moose population, abandoned in the beginning of the last century, is grows quickly.

Most of the houses have room-high windows opening the seaside view. On the other side sometimes a door opens completely unexpected in the middle of the wall in three metres height. It seems that something was forgotten: A stairs maybe, or a terrace. Or is that a kind of mother-in-law door to get rid of unloved guests? I decide to be careful; I don’t know the manners in this country.

We are looking for a laundromat. What we find is a very nice couple that donates us t-shirts and caps, coffee, beer and soft ice. We might use Carmelita’s und John’s internet connection and their parking lot for the night and can chat with them for hours. North American coin washing machines in aren’t the same as in Europe. They are only half automatic and have simple radial drum. You have to add detergent, bleach and fabric softener in the right moment. At least the water runs in and out automatically, and there’s a spin as well.  The temperatures switch cold-warm-hot means only the temperature of the tap water running in. There is no heating in the machine. After half an hour the rumpus is over. Who is not satisfied with the result has to repeat the whole procedure. The dryers on the other hand seam to be very effective what you can read from the layer of fluffs in the adequate clothes’ colour that is attached to the filter after the drying process. The clothes likely become thinner in the same way.

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