Browse "Coastal Regions"

Following the retreat of glacial ice, about 13 000 years ago, the lowlands were nearly completely flooded by the sea to a height of 30 m.

Anse du Cap des Rosiers [Fr, "cove of the cape of rosebushes"] was named for the many wild rosebushes found there. The cape that forms the bay is a steep and shrub-covered promontory.

Lying north of mainland Canada, the Arctic Archipelago consists of 94 major islands (greater than 130 km2) and 36,469 minor islands covering a total of 1.4 million km2. Apart from Greenland, which is almost entirely ice covered, the Canadian Arctic Archipelago forms the world's largest High Arctic land area.

 Circulation is generally anticlockwise; off Greenland, relatively warm, salty water moves north, while along Baffin Island, cold, fresher water originating from the Arctic Ocean flows south. Icebergs, formed by calving off the Greenland glaciers, appear year-round, but are most numerous in August.

Bathurst Inlet, a southeastern extension of Coronation Gulf, penetrating the arctic shore for some 200 km. The hamlet of Bathurst Inlet is located at the mouth of the Burnside River, which drains Contwoyto Lake to the southwest.

Bay d'Espoir is a fjord-like arm of Hermitage Bay on Newfoundland’s south coast. More than 50 km from mouth to head, Bay d'Espoir — French for “hope” — is ice-free, with sheer cliffs and steep-sided hills rising 180 to 300 m. The bay divides into two principal arms to the north and northeast of Bois Island. Because of the tremendous watershed from a surrounding glacial plateau, the area is the site of a hydroelectric generating plant. Opened in 1967, today the plant has a generating capacity of more than 600 MW.

Between about 15 000 and 10 000 years ago, as the glaciers retreated from the last ice age, parts of Georges Bank and other shallow areas were dry land; fragments of trees and mammoth teeth from this era are still found occasionally in fishing trawls.

Bellot Strait, at 71° 58´ N, separates Somerset Island from the Boothia Peninsula, marking the northernmost point on the mainland of North America.

The importance of Beringia is twofold: it provided a pathway for intercontinental exchanges of plants and animals during glacial periods and for interoceanic exchanges during interglacials; it has been a centre of evolution and has supported apparently unique plant and animal communities.

Bonavista Bay is an inlet on the Atlantic coast of Newfoundland between Cape Freels and Cape Bonavista. Roughly 65 km wide, it contains a large number of densely forested islands that shelter the mainland from northeasterly winds and create hundreds of kilometres of virtually landlocked waters.

Cabot Strait, the passage between southwest Newfoundland and Cape Breton Island. Named for explorer John Cabot, it is 110 km wide between Cape Ray, Nfld, and Cape North, NS.

Cape Blomidon lies along the southeast shore of the Bay of Fundy at the mouth of Minas Basin, the site of some of the world's highest tides.

Cape Kildare extends eastward into the Gulf of St Lawrence at the northern end of Prince Edward Island. Named by Samuel Holland in 1765 after James, 20th earl of Kildare, it is part of a series of capes in the area known as the Kildare Capes.

Cape North is the northern promontory on Cape Breton Island.

Cape Race, elevation 30-40 m, is the southeastern extremity of Newfoundland's AVALON PENINSULA. Named for its flat-topped (Portuguese, raso) cliffs, it has a barren appearance that creates a stark impression for transatlantic