Ever since my preferred budget motel burned down in 2015, I've been stuck with the pricey ($149/night) Marystown Hotel & Convention Centre whenever I find myself in Marystown.

Today I was celebrating though and the celebration would have to be at the Marystown Hotel. Mushing my waterlogged gear into a corner of the car as I fished out my wallet, I sidled in trying not to rub my tomato-red thighs together; happy to simply throw down and treat myself. I'd been fantasizing about gently lowering myself into this hotel tub for days.

Except that the ancient tubs weren't wide enough the ol' Nav Dawg's hips, haha. It was nice to wash off the grime and tree sap, but not while shifting up my left side, then my right side.

I begrudgingly stood up and accepted that a shower would have to do.

Undeterred by my mediocre shower, it was still early in the day and I was about to get my kicks by checking off whatever nearby seedy bars with celebratory cold ones.

I figured Marystown had to have some cool old dives hanging on since it's a big enough town and it's the big smoke of the Burin Peninsula.

Over at the Marystown Mall, I saw my first sign...

Chalky's Pool Hall & Bar it is!

Where I'm normally nervous because of other customers, I got the other option here and it was slightly weird being the only person in Chalky's. The place seems popular enough on facebook, so let's chalk it up to it being a random Tuesday afternoon.

In actuality, I was pleased to sit back with a Coors Banquet in this strange mall pool hall, reminiscing on St. Kyran's and plotting my next moves for the Burin Peninsula. I didn't need to be back in Corner Brook for another six days after all.

Recently I've become obsessed with the Purple's Mountains' song Margaritas at the Mall, which made me think of how we don't really do the seedy bars at malls thing anymore.

I suppose Chalky's would have been an opportunity to get a margarita at a mall, but I won't have another chance after Chalky's moved not once, but twice since my visit.

Nearby, The Admiral's Gallery and Keg was closed temporarily, so I continued up Queen Street past the Riff's Department Store, peculiar insurance building, and the backside of Marystown's post office.

Looking at StreetView to jog my memory, it looks like I missed out on quite the dive bar with the demolition of the "Li'l Dory Lounge" in 2019. Marystown's West Side Charlie's (the local pool hall chain) has closed in the meantime as well.

The only other stop on this half-ass "Marystown Pub Crawl" was Mazie's Pub, which is a new bar since the last time Google StreetView came through here in 2013.

I liked how they clearly got whatever NHL Stanley Cup championship flags via Coors Light cases then proceeded to put them all up. I also wonder if it was a matter of how they could find someone to take the Bruins/Leafs/Habs/Blackhawks flags, but no one wanted the Isles or Sens, haha.

There was one more bar in Marystown, but I couldn't tell if it was actually open today and it looked really far away on a map.

Funny thing is that I overestimated the scale and it was only about a 20 minute walk that I didn't conquer. Whoops.

Back at the hotel for the night, I was excited about a long night's rest in a big ol' comfy bed. Gran Torino was on the TV and I lounged the F out.

The next day I got back to normalcy with a stop by the Marystown Skatepark.

I was curious how I'd fare physically after the Kyran's hike, but raw thighs and blistered feet didn't hinder the shredding at all. One of the things I managed was to finally get on top of Marystown's Canadian Ramp Company jersey barrier.

I also posted a clip involving their hip and down rail, to which Steve said it was great to see people still riding. Feels good to be still riding too, Steve.

Afterwards I popped out to nearby Beau Bois, both because I didn't have a pic of the village of Little Bay between Marystown and Beau Bois, and because I remembered Beau Bois being quite striking the one other time I'd visited during the day's last light.

Eventually I would have to, y'know, actually leave Marystown and do something more productive with my four remaining Burin days.

So I stopped again in Frenchman's Cove because I always want to photograph this interesting channel dividing their town.

I'm pretty sure this is just a concrete wall along an already straight creek, haha.

Still though, you don't see this level of infrastructure in small Newfoundland towns. Which means I've always thought Frenchman's Cove was worth a stop.

This channel is a heck of a lot cooler than some salty rock beside the ocean or whatever foothill.

Next up on the northern shore of the Burin's boot, was the ghost town of Molliers. I had been to Molliers previously, but back in 2012 I had only been to the handful of cabins out by the highway.

This area was the old cove area of the real Molliers, which I didn't even know existed until I stumbled upon some motorcycling forum post a number of years ago.

While a lot of these resettled places have the same tale of a small period of prosperity and growth where the town climbed above a couple hundred people, instead, Molliers was never that much of a settlement.

It's believed that a settler by the name of Robert Bennett was here in 1819, but Molliers wasn't listed on the census until 1857 (when it was grouped with Little Barasway and together they had a population of 11).

Church and school services were held in a local home by the 1880s, and by 1921, Molliers reached its peak population of 38. Thereafter, residents trickled out as they headed to nearby Fortune, Grand Bank, and the other Burin communities with modern amenities and greater work opportunities.

The population was listed as 5 in 1971, but the Encyclopedia of Newfoundland notes that the last family left in the 1970s. The site became an area for RVs and summer cabins, while one George White was the only one living in Molliers full time in the 1990s.

Those aforementioned cabins were far enough away and no one else was around. Coupled with a fantastic temperature and a wind strong enough to keep the flies away while not being too harsh on the ears, I had a lovely meander about the grassy cove of Molliers.

It was only mid-afternoon, but God was I tempted to set up the tent for the night.

I briefly entertained climbing inside this ramshackle home, but I eventually settled on taking a picture through the missing window.

Another house and its shed stood only a hundred feet up the road/path into Molliers.

This one was a lot more interesting with the televisions from the 1970s and a solid collection of coffee mugs, but it must've also been abandoned for many years as it was pretty rundown too.

Lunch was in Grand Bank where I sadly saw that they tore down another building and I also went and did my customary laugh at the idea of pulling a Nailhed and climbing the mooring rope to get on to the derelict Atlantic Pursuit.

I won't have to weigh that decision anymore though, as after 16 years in the Grand Bank harbour, DFO finally just paid to scrap the ship themselves and it was removed in 2022.

(With my fear of derelict ships and it being the middle of the afternoon, I was never going to shuffle across on the mooring rope anyway.)

I like to ride BMX at places that only say No Skateboarding, while also fantasizing about rollerblading whenever the sign leaves out rollerblading, or skateboarding when it says No Bikes, or whatever.

Grand Bank's United Church wasn't having any of my shenanigans.

The nearby Town of Fortune had me covered though, especially on such a fine day when I previously had to skip this park due to inclement weather.

Newfoundland Skatepark #38! And I had a pretty good time!

Anyway, I usually like to stop these multi-part travelogues at the end of a day or right before something remarkable - but this portion of the trip around the Burin just doesn't really lend itself to that.

So we'll just stop here after a fine session in Fortune.

Continue to Part 5...