Twillingate

People have lived on these islands for a very long time. The Maritime Archaic occupied the area around 3,500 years ago, and were later followed by the Beothuk, and possibly the Dorset, who lived here until Europeans arrived. The French may have fished these waters as early as 1500. The first European settlers came in the 17th century, mostly fishermen and their families from the West Country of England. The Beothuk survived in small numbers near Twillingate and the mouth of the Exploits River until the early 19th century.

The sheltered harbour and the rich fishing grounds nearby made Twillingate an important fishing community, and for more than two centuries it was a busy trade and service centre for the Labrador and northern shore fisheries. It had its own newspaper, the Twillingate Sun, from the 1880s until the 1950s, covering local, provincial and international news. The town was incorporated in 1965, taking in smaller localities such as Back Harbour, Bayview, Durrell and Wild Cove, and the Walter B. Elliott causeway now links the islands to the main island of Newfoundland.

The moratorium on fishing northern cod, announced on 2 July 1992, and the collapse of the fishery that followed forced the town to look to tourism for income, becoming a popular spot for visitors in the summer, drawn by icebergs, whales and the festival.

Twillingate residents value the area's culture and traditions, and folk music and festivities are central to them. Traditional Newfoundland songs such as "I's the B'y", whose chorus runs "Fogo, Twillingate, Moreton's Harbour, all around the circle", and "Lukey's Boat" are still sung at local events. In summer, dinner theatre, kitchen parties and local musicians entertain visitors. Mummering at Christmas, once common here, is now practised by fewer people.

The Fish, Fun and Folk Festival at the end of July is the town's big event, with local talent, dances and Newfoundland entertainment, a parade, fireworks and a screech-in, the mock ceremony in which visitors kiss a fish, drink a shot of screech and become "Honorary Newfoundlanders".

The town has two museums — the Twillingate Museum, with Maritime Archaic artefacts found at Back Harbour, and the Durrell Museum — and several art galleries. Hockey matters too: in 2020 Twillingate was named the Kraft Hockeyville Canada champion, winning a quarter of a million dollars in upgrades for the George Hawkins Arena. The seal hunt is still practised here, and the town was the setting for Anne Troake's 2005 documentary about her family's long involvement in it.

About 2,100 people lived in Twillingate at the 2021 census, a fall of about 3 per cent from 2016, continuing a long decline. The population is ageing: the median age rose steadily through the 1990s and 2000s and is well above the provincial average.

Since the cod moratorium, fishing is practised much less, though some fishermen still catch crab, lobster and other species. Most jobs now are in construction, logging and services to the community, and summer tourism is a big part of the economy — boat tours, B&Bs, cottages, restaurants and craft shops all depend on the season. The town calls itself the "Iceberg Capital of the World".

The town stretches along a series of coves on two islands, from Bayview and Durrell to Back Harbour and Wild Cove, most of it close to sea level, with parts of Durrell, Bayview and the centre on higher ground. Route 340 runs through as Toulinquet Street and Main Street, and the Tickle Bridge joins the north and south islands. Gander, about an hour and a half away, is the nearest larger town for flights and many services.

Food here is the cooking of a Newfoundland fishing port. Fish and chips, made with cod, is the everyday meal in the town's restaurants and takeaways, along with chowder and, in season, fresh lobster; crab is also landed by local fishermen.

Older island dishes remain home cooking. Fish and brewis combines salt cod with hard bread softened in water, often with scrunchions, small pieces of fried pork fat. Toutons, fried bread dough, are eaten with molasses, and Jiggs dinner — salt beef boiled with cabbage, potatoes, carrot and turnip — is a traditional Sunday meal. Seal flipper pie is a dish of the spring seal hunt, still practised in Twillingate.

Wild berries grow across the islands, and the local winery in Durrell turns them, along with water from icebergs, into fruit wines and even wine ice cream. Bakeapples, the local name for cloudberries, and partridgeberries go into jams, pies and sauces. Screech, a Jamaican rum bottled in the province, is the drink of the screech-in.