Newfoundland Adventures part 10: Gander

Gander. A town many of us first learned about through the hit Broadway musical "Come from Away."

On the northeast tip of North America,

on an island called Newfoundland,

there's an airport.

It used to be one of the biggest airports in the world,

and next to it is a town called Gander.

And so begins Come from Away.

On Thursday, July 24th we drove two hours from Trinity to Gander. They really are in the middle of nowhere. We passed one bathroom stop, and signs to watch out for moose, and kept driving. Gander has four exits off of the Trans Canada Highway making it the biggest town we had seen since we left St. John's.

As we passed the Shoppers and turned into the Sinbad Hotel's parking lot we knew we were in for a special trip.

When I looked at the Come from Away Gander website I saw a link for a hotel package that included two tickets to the show. The options were the Sinbad or the Albatross. The hotels are a toss up, we chose the Sinbad because it was a 10-minute walk away from the community center instead of a 12-minute walk. They were both steps back to the time when Gander was a happening place. Their description on hotels.com says "we are now newly renovated and we are a 4-star hotel." The reviews say the place is a bit dated. I side with the reviews on this one. We checked in after the show and checked out after turning down their breakfast knowing the Gander Bread Box across the street would have better food. 

The hotel was busier than expected due to hosting refugees from the forest fires an hour or so north of Gander. Once again, Gander was the spot to take care refugees. Later in the trip we noticed the ice rink was converted into a place for refugees to get help. It is hard to complain about a room not being ready early (or even on time) when someone struggling with worry over possibly losing their home was taking longer to check out. They assured us it would work out, gave us our tickets for the show and asked us to come back later. We did, and it worked out.

The town reminded me of Ewing, NJ in that the vast majority of homes and neighborhoods sprang up in the post-WWII era. It feels like a planned community. Most everything is walking distance. Houses are clustered together in neighborhoods. Airport Road is the main stretch with businesses and the Steele Community Center on it, and the schools and town hall just off of it. The airport is about two miles from the center of town, and the airport museum is on the Trans Canada Highway -- a road that looks like a small Route 1 as it passes through town and like an interstate highway the rest of the time.

There are interpretive panels in front of many of the places mentioned in the musical. The schools that housed people. The SPCA (which is about to be moved, so their panel is currently not up). Town Hall. Steele Community Center. The day of the show we walked to many of the sites. The day after seeing the show we drove to the ones further afield. That merits a separate post as it will be very picture heavy.

After spending two days in Trinity with very limited food options, we were overwhelmed by the choices in Gander. We asked the owner of a new and used bookstore where we should go for dinner. She mentioned a couple of local places, but when she asked what day it was (Thursday) she highly recommended Rosie's and their Jiggs Dinner or Sunday Dinner Special. She encouraged us to head there immediately because Thursday nights are popular with the locals, too, and there will be a line. The night before we heard Jiggs Dinner referenced in Shenanigans and knew this would be our only chance to try this. It didn't matter what THIS was.

Rosie's turned out to be a 24-minute walk, so we went back to the hotel and drove there. The line filled most of the lobby and was not moving. People in line were doing the same thing we were doing. The servers assured us "it should work out." Hmm...finally after 15-minutes one group went in. Then another. Then a tall woman and her friend cut to the front of the line because they had reservations. She told us she made reservations for 6 pm because she is the director and has to be at the show before the 7:30 curtain. That was the moment when I realized it would really all work out.

A few moments later the staff separated a table set for six into a table of four, and a table of two just for us. We were told ours was table 6A -- a phantom table. As I dashed to the ladies' room, Don ordered two Jiggs Dinners without asking what they were. We got the two last ones!

Had we asked first, we would have continued looking at the menu. It is salted beef with scoops of potato, two hunks of carrots, a slice of turnip, some cabbage, and a scoop of something that did not match anything I could guess. A server came up to us after we had started eating and asked if we knew what we were having. I pointed to that blob, she said it was split peas like you would turn into soup. So, not at all what we would have ordered.

As we paid our check a different server, knowing we were seeing the play, said "the part of the mayor was based off of my father." He further explained here they are called "town managers," but the play changed it to "mayor" because that term is better understood.

This was the moment Come from Away came alive for me. It was when I fully appreciated the town is full of people who have stories from that day. Many of whom are ready and willing to talk about it.

I am here. I am here in Canada.