Rocky Harbour → Twillingate
Rocky Harbour to Twillingate
- Drive time
- 5h 38m
- Distance
- 427.6 km
- Routes
- 430, 1, 340
Free-flow estimate, Rocky Harbour to Twillingate — no stops, dry roads.Source: OSRM driving profile, town centre to town centre, checked 2026-08-30.
This is the drive between the two things most people come to Newfoundland’s centre for: the fjords on the west coast and the icebergs on the east. Nobody publishes the figure, and the one people substitute for it — the distance between the two airports — understates it by an hour and three quarters.
It is a full day, and it is worth knowing that before you build an itinerary that assumes an afternoon.
Before you go
These change. We link the people who keep them current rather than copying numbers that go stale here.
MooseYear round, worst between dusk and dawn
The province states that the likelihood of injury in a moose collision is twice as high between dusk and dawn as in daytime. This is the longest drive on the site by a wide margin, which makes it the one most likely to end in the dark.
Check it now →Road conditionsYear round, matters most November–April
Most of this is Trans-Canada, which is the first road cleared and the last closed. The ends — Route 430 on the west, Routes 340 and 341 on the east — are not.
Check it now →
Questions people actually ask
How long does it take to drive between Gros Morne and Twillingate?＋
About 5 hours 38 minutes, covering 427.6 km — Route 430 down to the Trans-Canada, most of the island east, then north on Route 340. It measures the same in both directions. That is a free-flow estimate on dry roads with no stops, and it is a full day once you have eaten and filled up.
Isn't it about four hours? The airports are 3h56 apart.＋
That is the figure people reach for and it is the wrong one. The airports are 308.4 km apart because both sit near the Trans-Canada; these two towns are each an hour or more off it, at opposite ends. The real drive is 5 hours 38 — an hour and three quarters longer than the airport pair suggests.
Should I drive it or fly between the airports?＋
Drive it, if you are doing both ends anyway. Routing through the airports is worse: Twillingate to Gander is 1h48, Gander to Deer Lake 3h56, Deer Lake to Rocky Harbour 55 minutes — 6 hours 39 of driving against 5 hours 38 going direct, before you have parked or returned a car. The direct road is the shorter answer even though it looks longer on a map.
Can I do both ends in one trip?＋
Yes, but not in a long weekend. This drive is a day, so a trip covering both coasts needs at least four or five nights to be worth doing rather than endured. If you have three days, pick an end — and pick the airport that matches it.
Every distance, drive time and coordinate on this page was checked against its source on August 30, 2026. Origin: OpenStreetMap node/1551157400. Destination: OpenStreetMap node/107365649.