With accommodation limited along the East Coast Trail, we’ve curated high-quality lodging specifically geared towards the needs of hikers, and located close to your route. These are widely spaced along the trail and therefore your friendly transfer services will play a large role in getting you to and/or from the trail on many days. Our accommodations offer a home-stay atmosphere so you can get to know your friendly local hosts. Outside of St. John’s, lodging also includes outstanding meals and packed lunch facilities.

Port Kirwan: Belle Maison Dine & Dream
When you think about a hiker’s hut, it’s typically a spartan wooden shed with a couple of bunks, a wood stove, and perhaps some splintering chairs that have seen better years. On the south coast of the East Coast Trail, Belle Maison Dine and Dream keeps the emphasis on the hiking but completely reimagines the hiker’s hut into lodging as memorable as the famed trail itself. The first thing you’ll notice when you pull up to Belle Maison are the colourful shipping containers and trailers. Inspired by the tiny home movement, hiking quarters are cozy, comfortable and flexible. The containers – converted into two rooms with ensuite bathrooms – originally held furniture and equipment shipped from Alberta. The ridiculously well-stocked snack shack is equipped with handy boot dryers, games, books, and additional hiking poles. Click on the button below to learn more about Sharon's Belle Maison Dine and Dream.

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Bay Bulls Harbour: The Bread and Cheese Inn
Tucked away in the historic community of Bay Bulls, the Bread and Cheese Inn offers a breathtaking ocean view, comfortable rooms, knowledgeable and welcoming hosts, and fantastic dining. Owners Paula has a Certificate in Pastry Arts from the French Pastry School, and Pablo is a professional cook by way of oceanography and coffee trading. The on-site restaurant is full of Spanish and Asian influences, served in a casual setting around a big wooden table. The Inn is cozy, full of history, and surrounded by local characters. The Bread and Cheese is conveniently located on the East Coast Trail.

Trailhead transfers are generally scheduled around 9-9:30am, with pick-ups around 5-5:30pm, allowing you plenty of daylight hours to complete the day’s hike, and lots of time to appreciate your surroundings, stop for a scenic lunch break, and even explore some side trails.

Be sure you’ve confirmed a pick-up time and location with our local shuttle service. If you know you require more or less time on the trail, please reschedule your pickup time with the driver accordingly, as our shuttle is on a tight schedule and cannot wait far beyond the planned pickup time. If it is getting dark and you have not shown up at the pickup point and we are unable to get a hold of you on the trail, we will call emergency services for assistance. You will be responsible for any related costs of such services, as well as the cost of any local services which are above and beyond those outlined in our documentation. To avoid this situation please know your pace and abilities and, if there is any doubt, please reschedule pickup times in advance, or consider skipping the more strenuous hikes (such as the Flamber Head and Deadman's Bay paths).

Luggage Considerations
We recommend one soft-sided bag per person, weighing a maximum of 33lbs/15kg for the luggage transfers. On days when you are moving to the next inn, your luggage will be picked up in the morning, usually when you are being dropped to the trailhead. Please have it packed and ready when you leave each day. Sometimes your luggage will have been taken to your room awaiting your arrival at the next accommodation, however don’t be surprised if your luggage is waiting for you to take it to your room.

If you have any excess luggage, please coordinate directly with the joining hotel in advance to see if they can store it for you. If not, we recommend directly reaching out to a storage service provider for the duration of your tour.

Due to the remoteness of the trails and unreliable mobile reception in the area, Great Canadian Trails provides a Garmin devices to hikers as a safety precaution and for ease of communication with our ground operator.

Always keep the device ON when hiking, and the tracking function should also be turned ON at all times so our team can see where you are on the trail.

The device is not meant for personal usage but only for messaging in case you are running early/late, and the SOS function is there in case you require emergency services/rescue.

Forget the cumbersome prints maps, and relax searching for the trail markers!

Our custom-built convenient and free travel app utilizes GPS to tell you where you are, and where to go. It includes all relevant trip information including contacts, maps, real-time length and time data, with optional alerts.

Importantly, it works perfectly in airplane mode too, so you do not have to have cell coverage, or chew up any roaming data.

The app works on any smartphone or tablet, iOS or Android (although it must have a built-in GPS to navigate). We recommend logging onto a wifi network to download the app and your particular trip information, combined that’s about 400MB of data.

Full instructions for the app are provided with your departure documents.