19th century Blue Willow china plate found at Meany's Point site.

For nearly 5000 years people have been attracted to the Bird Cove area.
Why?
You’ll understand once you’ve visited yourself!

The Archaeology / Culture Guided Tour allows you to see what goes on behind the scenes in the Bird Cove Project. Tour guides will take you to the Big Droke and Caines sites, which were first excavated in 1997. Here, 4500 years ago, Maritime Archaic Indians lived their daily lives; crafting woodworking and hunting tools, fishing, cooking and playing.

A boardwalk meanders around the two sites; providing for a leisurely walk and is wheelchair accessible. Through the words and actions of your tour guide, you will become enveloped in another lifetime.

From here, you will visit the Peat Garden and Peat Garden North sites; which have been identified as Groswater Palaeoeskimo, Dorset Palaeoeskimo and Cowhead Complex Recent Indian sites. As recently as August 2002, unique finds discovered at these sites, have provided a clearer picture of the past lives of these prehistoric peoples; who inhabited the island of Newfoundland from 2800 to 1100 years ago. Incredibly, recent generations of local Bird Cove residents lived in homes built atop of these very sites.

The rich resources of the land and sea have drawn people for millenniums….centuries… which will become very clear as you stroll past the prehistoric sites to finds of a more recent time. Early Europeans, too, explored the very beaches which you will walk along; Basques, French, Irish, English, Scottish. As you approach the Meany’s Point site which has historic stone and whalebone in its housing structure, sometimes you think you can hear voices….whispers. It is in fact, the sounds of waves pulling on the shoreline mixed with the soft saltwater breezes.

There are many stories to be related about the past, present and future residents of Bird Cove and the surrounding communities. They have always been a strong, hardy people…living off what the land and sea has provided. Just as in years gone by, when, for whatever reasons, the land or sea has briefly failed them, the residents have had to learn to adapt or to move on. Residents of Bird Cove and the surrounding communities are faced with this very dilemma today, with the closure of the fish plant in 1992 and the cod moratorium in 1993. But, almost in a twist of fate, the land and sea have provided them with new resources…archaeological finds and an amazing cultural heritage….ones that will allow them to once again grow and provide a promising future.

Join our local tour guides for a historical account you’ll not soon forget…. you’ll be touched by the land…the sea…the people…..
you’ll want to call it home, too!