Half the fun of going to L'Anse aux Meadows is the trip there. I and my friend drove up the Viking Trail -- the winding, hilly highway of Newfoundland's Great Northern Peninsula -- in 1995 with an unbelievably strong south wind at our backs. We took turns riding our bicycles -- one of us drove, one of us rode, pushed along effortlessly by the wind, past little villages and rocky bays.
By the time we arrived at L'Anse aux Meadows, we were quite pumped up with our riding adventure and the wonderful ruggedness of the landscape. We toured the site. I remember stooping to enter the reconstructed sod houses and wondering how those people managed to survive here so long ago in this unforgiving environment. We walked the trails and watched the sun go down, probably one of the most beautiful sunsets I'd seen in my life.
It wasn't a busy place when we went and probably isn't now. It's the kind of place where you can still feel the presence of the people who lived here a thousand years in the past.