Part of the reason we drove all that distance up the Viking Trail, through the UNESCO World Heritage site of Gros Morne National Park, to St. Anthony was so we could embark on our quest to see an iceberg, or in actuality an abundance of icebergs. Z quickly nicknamed these massive icebergs "ice cubes". Perhaps the humour in this only lies with the two of us, but hearing him call them ice cubes was quite funny.
We had booked a ice berg and whale watching tour with Northland Discovery Tours out of St. Anthony. Now, we could have actually booked a similar type tour that didn't take us to the northern tip of the island of Newfoundland, but where would the fun in that be? Our tour was scheduled for 9am and we were told to arrive 20 minutes early. We planned accordingly and got ourselves up with enough time to have breakfast at Tim Hortons because we had read that the Timmies in St. Anthony is the only location that offers a speciality donut during the Iceberg Festival; the iceberg donut. So with a name like that, why wouldn't you want to try it? It was a very delicious novelty to try once.
We arrived at Northland Discovery Tours at the time we were told and found out that our tour was actually pushed back to 10am because they were expecting high wind later in the day and had to adjust their schedule and were trying to accommodate a bus tour group. No big deal, we really had no other choice and just went with the flow. We thought it a little strange though that when we called a couple days earlier to confirm nothing was said to us then. We sat by the water as we waited and ended up having some good chats with others who arrived early as well and had no clue our tour was heading out an hour later. The morning was beautiful, the sun was out, the scenery absolutely incredible and the company great so it made the time go by that much quicker.
Our tour was amazing. The weather was perfect, the wind was not too strong and so we only experienced about 1 foot swells so the boat was not swaying too much. Our guide, Steve, was not only quite humorous, but also very knowledgable and informative. As we approached the first iceberg for an up close view, we heard the theme song of the movie, The Titanic playing. This really brought the enormity of icebergs to reality. And to think that only 1/9 of the entire iceberg is visible above the water level. It's truly amazing to think about. While we were passing one iceberg we were treated to the loud thunderous cracking sound of a chunk of the berg breaking away from the main structure. It was pretty cool to hear. At one point Steve fished out a small piece of berg from the ocean and broke it up so we could taste it. First though he asked whether we thought it would taste salty or not. Surprisingly, to me, it was not in the least bit salty. Because the iceberg is so dense, the salt water is unable to penetrate it. We had heard from someone that there were about 25% more icebergs floating around Newfoundland this year compared to last. It's not surprising given the amount of bergs we got to see. I read after the fact that almost 1,000 icebergs had been counted in Iceberg Alley off the coast of Newfoundland making the North Atlantic shipping lanes extra dangerous this year. As global warming continues it can be expected that the numbers will only increase. The bergs are all originating from Greenland, making their way down to the coast of Newfoundland and according to Steve the bergs we saw on that day would be gone within a month. Gone not because they continued to flow south, but because they would be melted. We were the second tour of the day and Steve and our skipper both indicated that since the first tour some of the bergs had already shifted their position from the morning and certainly had shifted from the previous day. One of the icebergs we passed was concave and in the middle was those most brilliant turquoise coloured water. It was such a sight to see this smaller area of turquoise water within the great Atlantic ocean. There was another berg we saw up close where you could see very distinct water lines within it. 
As we continued on with the tour we were told to keep our eyes open for the spray of a humpback whale which shoots up into the air about 10 feet when they come up for air. While the tour had no guarantees of a whale sighting, there had been a couple sightings the day before, but none earlier in the morning. At one point I saw a head pop out of the water and while it wasn't a whale we encountered a seal. This seal seemed very aware that we were there and he was rather playful as he popped in and out of the water and flapped his fin on the surface. Towards the end of the tour a whale was spotted in the distance and we were off to chase it down. It took us some time to find it, but we did finally get a good glimpse of the lone humpback whale as he arched his back preparing for a dive into the deep. We also got a glimpse of his flukes and the distinct white markings on the underside These markings are what are used to tell one whale apart from another. Getting to see a whale at the end of the tour really made the tour feel fully complete. It was a great way to end a fantastic 2 hour tour.
Once we were back on dry land, it was lunch time and we decided to head back to the Lightkeeper's Restaurant. We had dinner there the night before and really enjoyed the atmosphere, and food. We wanted to try their moose sliders (which were super tasty!) so it was the perfect place to have lunch as it was only a 5 minute drive from the dock. For lunch we got a window table and could age out and admire the icebergs floating by. It was a great way to cap off our time in St. Anthony.
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