Happy Valley-Goose Bay NL Newfoundland-Labrador Canada
Frequently Asked Questions
Ships generally anchor in Lake Melville and land passengers by tender. The town sits at the head of this arm of the sea, which reaches nearly 200 km into Labrador.
The Labrador Military Museum and the Birch Island boardwalk fill a half day without leaving town. North West River, about 38 km away, adds an hour of driving each way.
Because of aviation. In 1941 the war turned this patch of forest into one of the largest airfields in the world, a staging point for thousands of aircraft ferried to Europe. 5 Wing of the Royal Canadian Air Force is still active here.
Photographs, documents and equipment tracing that aviation story, from Second World War bombers to NATO fighter jets that trained in these skies. Allow an hour among models, uniforms and accounts of landings in blizzards.
A wooden walkway of about 5 km reaching into the wetlands along the Churchill River. The trail is flat and accessible, with interpretive panels on the role of these marshes in the Lake Melville ecosystem.
The provincial interpretation centre and the local historical society museum, set in a former Hudson's Bay Company store with its counters and furs. A sand beach lines Lake Melville, and in clear weather the Mealy Mountains stand out across the water.
Innu, Inuit and the descendants of coastal trappers and settlers have crossed paths here for generations. The region is also the gateway to Nunatsiavut, the autonomous Inuit territory whose communities line the coast further north.
Crafts from Labrador communities: embroidered moccasins, stone carvings, grass baskets and clothing made for the subarctic. A few shops in town carry them.
Insect repellent in summer, no argument: the wetlands have their winged residents. Layer up, because Labrador weather changes fast, even in July.
No, and it is worth knowing before going ashore. There is no famous monument and no dramatic viewpoint: an outsized airfield beside an inland sea, a community of about 8,000 people, and wilderness starting at the end of every street.
