Gros Morne

                                           it’ll take your breath away

Gros Morne national park is located on the west coast of the island of Newfoundland and covers a whopping 1805 km2. The park protects two areas of two of Canada's landform regions: the Western Newfoundland island highlands and the St. Lawrence lowlands.

  http://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g580445-d1030730-Reviews-Western_Brook_ 

                Pond-Gros_Morne_National_Park_Newfoundland_Newfoundland_and_Labrado.html

Gros Morne has many exciting features and its landscape is the most unique in Canada! Because of this Gros Morne has been named a world heritage site  by UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization)  because of its breathtaking scenery and geographical significance, the geological diversity of Gros Morne is its main reason for its designation to a world heritage site. The table lands plateau is a 500 million year old slice through the earths crust and upper mantle and proof of plate tectonics. The sedimentary rocks of the coastal lowlands are home to countless long extinct sea creatures and the barrens of the long mountain range show rocks more than one billion years old. All these features of Gros Morne have been carved by long gone glaciers to create massive cliffs and valleys and the most dramatic landscape in canada.  

https://www.flickr.com/photos/newfoundlandlabradortourism/14131480454/

Gros Morne is not only know for its scenery it also has a rich variety of plants. A majority of the park is covered in boreal forests, with balsam fir as the dominant plant life. Bogs and fens are also common and worth exploring for beautiful flowers such as the dragon's mouth orchid.

Gros morne is also known for its wildlife although Gros Morne and the island of Newfoundland have fewer animal species than the mainland of Canada. There are no native amphibians or reptiles, Gros Morne only has 14 native species including woodland caribou, the arctic hare, moose, snowshoe hare, Harlequin duck and red squirrel.

Gros Morne is a great hiking destination for tourists if you like hiking Gros Morne is the place to go. the parks trails range from easy walks along the coast to steep climbs onto alpine barrens. A scenic highway through the park allows visitors to see the beautiful scenery and a wide range of landscape as they drive by and boat tours are also available to visit the parks marine areas and lakes. There are many indoor and outdoor camping grounds and Gros Morne is even open in the winter for skiing on groomed trails. If you want to learn about Gros Mornes history there is a discovery center at woody point that has interactive exhibits and interpretive programs.

        http://www.cbc.ca/sevenwonders/wonder_gros_morne.html

Overall Gros Morne is a great destination for travellers and tourists. It has a wide range of activities and things to do as well as beautiful ancient mountains. Gros Mornes wide range of plant and animal life also makes it a must see destination.Its unique geology is well preserved and hopefully will be for a long time. Visit Gros Morne, it’ll take your breath away!      

Earth Hour:

Time to turn the lights off!

Blogged b:y Kaitlyn  

 

Nottawasaga Pines Secondary School enjoys taking part in Earth Hour. All schools in Canada participate in Earth Hour to raise awareness about the climate change. Schools are not the only ones that celebrate earth hour but everyone in Canada and the world.

 

Earth hour started in 2007 by World Wildlife Fund (WWF). WWF's earth hour is a lights-off event to raise awareness about the climate change. The movement has grown to engage more than 162 countries and territories worldwide. 

Being in dark may sound unusual but there are fun ways to celebrate earth hour in the dark such as:

• Go for a walk in your neighbourhood
• Play games outside
• Play glow stick tag
• Light a fire outside (but be sure to be safe!)
• Light candles in your house (but be sure to be safe!)
• Spend good quality time with your family

Hopefully you will choose to celebrate Earth Hour with the world on Saturday, March 28th at 8:30pm.

Photo from: https://www.flickr.com/photos/wolfwl/7957398258/

Yoho National Park of Canada

Blogged by: Audrey

Are you looking for an escape from your hectic everyday life? Perhaps you’ve been  scavenging for a sanctuary to find yourself. Or maybe simply searching for the perfect family vacation spot. Well look no further than Yoho National Park of Canada.

This national park is located in British Columbia, directly on the west coast of Canada.This park also has a location where you can explore the beautiful Rocky Mountains with friends and family.This park showcases the beauty of British Columbia and truly captures the nation`s history. Yoho was established in 1886 therefore is overflowing with history.

With this generation's quantity of electronics and devices sometimes we really need to remember where we came from, and explore nature.What better place do that in the park that was declared a world heritage system in 1981. Yoho is also stunning to look at, because of its flowering fields and jagged mountains. 

Visiting this national park might also be your only opportunity to see animals such as mountain goats.When visitors come to this park, they often do actives such as canoeing,rock climbing, hiking, driving through scenic paths, horseback riding and reconnecting with their inner self. 

As you can see Yoho is a perfect spot for discovering Canada,escaping from everyday life, and spending a wonderful family vacation.

Mr. Lesage’s Travel Experiences

Blogged by: Tony and Seth

  Mr. Lesage has traveled all over the world he has been in places like China, India, and London England he traveled wherever the wind took him until he was 24.

   He remembers being in India visiting religious grounds there was a river that joined many religions together and in this river the people of different religions did different things like performing sacrifices and bathing in the river.

       Mr. Lesage has also traveled to Waterhen Lake, Saskatchewan to teach grade seven where he had explained to us the extremely harsh weather conditions.

    He also recalls riding a camel along the border of Pakistan/India while there was an increasing conflict between the countries.  He said “I remember seeing all the gunmen about every 100 meters apart from each other and all the small shacks filled with guns and ammunition.  It was definitely a different experience!”

Traveling inside of Canada

Blogged by: Dylan

Taken from: http://www.slice.ca/travel/blog/seeking-out-bonhomme-at-the-quebec-winter-carnival/2824/ courtesy of ‘Carnaval de Quebec’

Zimmer, Lori. “Inhabitat Spends the Night in Quebec's Hotel de Glace Ice Castle!” General Blog. Inhabitat. 30 November 2014. 23 February 2015.

Kaminesky, Ken. “Dinosaur Provincial Park, Alberta, Canada.” Photo Blog. Ken Kaminesky Photography. 29 March 2010. 23 February 2015.

People always travel to other countries in the world for tourism or travel, but a lot of people don’t realize that there is already so much to do in Canada. The CN tower is always a hot tourist attraction. But if you’re looking to get out of your area then you could go to the Quebec Winter Carnival. Up to one million people attended the ‘Carnaval de Quebec’ in 2006, making it one of the biggest winter festivals in the world. Hôtel de Glace, located just 10 minutes away from downtown Quebec, it is the only ice hotel in North America. Made from ice and a metal frame, this ice hotel is completely safe. You could even travel to Alberta and visit the Dinosaur Provincial Park. This park is known for being one of the richest dinosaur fossils locales in the world. I may have only mention three but there is so much to explore and discover in Canada.

Travel Experiences of a High school Principal!

by: Karol, Brittany, and Ian

     Mr. Macdonald is the principal of our school  Nottawasaga Pines Secondary School,

and we found out that he has great travel experiences and amazing stories to tell us. One cold, very cold February day we sat down with him, and asked him questions about his travels. He told us so many amazing stories that we are now going to share with all of you. Our conversation started off with questions about his favourite travel destinations, here's just a few of them.

http://www.newzealandshores.com/snapshot-new-zealand-life.html , March 3 2015

Destinations & Why: 

1.New Zealand- Because its like all of canada shrunk into one little country

2.Mexico- Because the food was so good there 

3.Tibet- A place that is so different but beautiful at the same time

4.Thailand- Because its a very warm and friendly place

5.China- Because its a completely different world than our own.

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Culture_University March, 3,2015    

Next we found out that while Mr. Macdonald was traveling through Hong Kong he had both his passport and wallet stolen from him, that's one of the worst things that can happen to you while traveling. While talking about bad travel experiences, he told us what his least favourite travel destinations are, they are below.   

http://sport.gentside.com/ko/wallpaper , March, 3 2015     

http://www.fiestasguadalajara.com/mexicanfoodarticle.html, March, 3 2015     

Destinations & Why dislikes:

1. Magnolia- Not warm, a very cold place and not it's the cleanest place either.
2. Arkansas-  Said to be the armpit of the world.

Mr. Macdonald wants to take a trip around the the world. Two of the top places he wants to go is Greece and Karkasia, but he never told us why he wants to go there. He also gave us a couple travel tips. They are that when you travel you should eat local and and to get out of the cities and that you should get out of the main cities.

If there are anymore question you may have about our principals travel experiences then post them in the comments, and we will try to answer them the best we can over the rest of the semester.

                                

Nottawasaga Pines Athlete Star!

Mr. Larmon’s Travels…

Wales (worldfortravel.com)

By: Natalie and Kaitlyn

Nottawasaga Pines secondary school has a fine athletics department as well as fine staff. Our teachers go above and beyond to make sure that the students are successful. One of our fine staff members is Mr. Larmon.

England (wantster.com)

Mr. Larmon has travelled a lot and for obvious reasons; sports. He has travelled to Ireland, England, Scotland, Wales and The United States of America. He has not travelled to these amazing countries for vacation but for Rugby Tours. Either as a coach or a student, he travelled South or overseas for the love of sports. 

Ireland (podas.info)

I can personally say from both myself and Kaitlyn that he is strong because during these tours, he did not get injured. I’m proud to be his student and wish him all the best and look forward to hearing more fun adventures.

Our Personal Travel Experiences                                                                     

By: Michael and Meghan

        Hello, our names are Michael and Meghan, we are grade eleven students at Nottawasaga Pines Secondary School located in a small town called Angus. We both have traveled quite a lot and still want to travel to see the many different cultures around the world. We both enjoy traveling, and have many relatives from around the world who we would like to visit.

Michael's Experiences.

       

Hello my name is Michael, I would love to travel the world. The farthest I have ever been away from home is Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. I have been to South Carolina many times. When traveling to Myrtle Beach we often stop in West Virginia and spend a day or two there to enjoy the scenery and sights in the mountains. I have also traveled to North Carolina many times, we often stop here when traveling to myrtle Beach. The places I would like to travel to the most would be Japan and Chicago. I would like to visit Japan because the culture has always seemed very interesting to me. I would like to go to Chicago to see the city and a Cubs game. In conclusion I have never left North America but hope to one day.

My name is Meghan, I am very interested in traveling and hope to have a job involving it in some way. I have already traveled a fair bit, but am no where near traveling to all the places I hope. In kindergarten I traveled to South Africa with my mother. We went to visit my family but I really enjoyed the culture and landscape. When I was 9 I went to England and Wales. It rained a lot there but I still enjoyed it very much. My favourite part was she weren't to platform 9 3/4 from the Harry Potter movie. Later on I went to Alberta,to visit my dad. He had to work there for 3 months so my family went to see him. I also have been to Florida when I was 13 and went to Disney for the first time. My family and I enjoyed it so much we are going back this year. When I am finished high school I would really love to backpack through Europe. I want to see as many countries as possible! One of my biggest goals is to teach English in Thailand. My dream would to work in a job involving travel and help different countries all over the world.

In conclusion we both are very interested in seeing the world and all it has to offer. We have both done a fair bit of  traveling but aren't close to being finished, coming from a small town with barely anything to do traveling would be life changing.

Introduction. (n.d.). Retrieved February 24, 2015, from http://www.myrtlebeachschotels.org/

South Africa. (n.d.). Retrieved February 24, 2015, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Africa

From Fiji to Europe -

The Adventures of Mr. Rutters

By: Josh and Maddee

Mr. Rutters is a teacher at our school Nottawasaga Pines Secondary School. He has travelled to many different destinations around the world including; Fiji, New Zealand, Costa Rica, Dominican, Europe, Australia, and more. 

So far in our class we have learned about the differences between mass and alternative tourism. Mass tourism is when there is a large group of people travelling to the same destination and doing very similar activities (cruise, all-inclusive). Alternative tourism is small groups of people travelling around to different places on their own and usually are there for longer periods of time. 

Mr. Rutters has experienced both mass and alternative tourism. Be has done an all inclusive to Dominican and Cuba and has organized his own trips with his wife to Fiji, Belize, Costa Rica, Australia and many more. He said that there was both many pro’s and con's to each type of tourism and decided that depending on if he wants to relax or be adventurous is how he would decide how he will travel to each destination.

We asked Mr. Rutters a few generic questions about his travel experience including “where was the first out of continent trip and his favourite places to travel?”. His first trip was to Europe. He flew into Belgium and then backpacked around surrounding areas. This is an example of alternative traveling. 

Mr. Rutters is a well rounded traveler and tends not to travel to the same place. He went on to explain that he likes to “do”. If he is traveling he does not want to just sit on a beach and watch the waves, he would rather be out seeing the sights and experiencing everything the area has to offer. In our interview Mr. Rutters seemed to hang on the topic of New Zealand. He said that New Zealand is the perfect spot for anyone looking for adventure or extreme sports. When Mr. Rutters was in New Zealand he skydived, skied, surfed and more. He went on to say that everyone you encounter is friendly and very helpful. New Zealand is a perfect place for backpacking due to its safe and friendly atmosphere. 

Fiji was another destination that Mr.Rutter’s had nothing but great things to say. He said that Fiji was a very relaxed place. He then began to tell the story of going for a massage and waiting for hours for the masseuse. When he asked why they were hours late after the time that he had booked they told him that they go by "Fiji Time" which means that they do whatever they are doing whenever they want. In Fiji Mr. Rutters had the opportunity to scuba dive, swim with sharks, and skydive. He said that the temperature was beautiful and highly recommend travelling there. 

The last question that we asked Mr. Rutters was if he had any advice to give us when we start traveling on our own. He told us to always have the local currency and American money because most countries will accept it. He also told us to always bring aloe with us on vacations because it is not a common thing sold in hot countries. The last piece of advice that Mr. Rutters gave us was that when going on vacation anywhere 7 days is way to short and you have to stay there for 10 days at minimum to get the best experience.

　

Photos courtesy of Mr.Rutters