Charlottetown & PEI

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On Monday we drove to Charlottetown on Prince Edward Island. It's not a long drive from Shediac — only about 2 hours away, mostly on very good Trans Canada highways (Nos. 15 and 16 in NB and No. 1 in PEI) and much of that is 4 lane expressway. There's also that impressive Confederation Bridge to the island that makes the trip quicker. Not too long ago you needed to take a ferry across the Northumberland Strait which separates the island from mainland Canada. There still is a ferry, further along in NS, but the bridge is very convenient.

The 13km (sic!) Confederation Bridge opened in 1997 — at 8 miles that's longer than the famous 7 mile bridge in the Florida Keys. It's not the longest bridge in the world, but it's up there. There is a ferry to the island from Caribou, NS which is a little further along the way (see Northumberland Ferries). I suppose when the bridge is closed, as it sometimes is for high winds and rough weather, one would have to continue on to that crossing. That would add many hours to our trip. The bridge fee is interesting. It costs you nothing to go to PEI, it costs about $50 to return over the bridge!

As we are approaching the bridge we decide that a bathroom break might be required (later learning that there's a great shopping area on the PEI side with every possible convenience including wash rooms). We take what we think might be the last exit before the bridge and drive along a secondary road through the village of Bayfield searching for a pit-stop. We find the Cape Tormentine Beach Campground which looks like a good spot and, we think, must have a pissoir. Had we continued along the shore here we would have come to Cape Spear (not to be confused with Cape Spear, NFLD — the most easterly point in North America).

It turns out that this Tormentine Beach campground used to be the staging area for a big ferry that went to the island. There's a huge paved parking area that would have been the staging area for vehicles waiting on the ferry. Now it's empty with a performance stage for special events, concerts and the like in the summer. There's a dirt and land fill barrier at the end which blocks the old access road to the pier. It's a very big campground with many trailers and mobile homes but it's off season and there's not many folk around. I am amazed that the east coast tourist season is so abbreviated. But again, we are having very nice weather. I expect in the summer months this place is hopping and the wide sandy beach would be an important draw.

After the pit stop we drive back a bit and find a way around the barrier in the campground and out onto the old pier. There's a lighthouse on the shore; a traditional wooden building painted white with red trim, I suppose it's still in operation. Apparently there's a shabby little lighthouse on the end of the pier, but we didn't get there. There is still commercial activity on the pier and it is a working harbor — fishing boats and a factory/warehouse of some sort. There's a good view of the bridge in the distance and the campground behind us on the arc of a wide sandy beach.

The Confederation bridge crosses a couple of small islands, the last of which, Cape Jourimain, has a pull off and information center. We stop for some closeups of the bridge. There's an information center and another lighthouse to explore but we're bound for Charlottetown and lunch. A quick "snap, snap" and we're back on the road.

The shopping area, immediately when you arrive on PEI, is quite large. There's a PEI Alcool store (c.f., LCBO Ontario), a brewery, restaurants, gift shops and much more. The gift shop is loaded with Anne of Green Gables (that's Anne with an E) dolls, books, trinkets and much more. I recall our grade school teacher reading the book to us when I was in the middle grades. If you're Canadian, you know the story. We are not that interested in her; although many tourists come to PEI to visit her "home" not knowing, or caring, that she's entirely a fictional character by Lucy Maud Montgomery.  We discovered that the gift shop was unloading a bunch of glassware on sale and ended up buying some wine glasses, champagne flutes, and martini glasses at give away prices. Our AirBnB is not well stocked; we reckon we'll use them at the wedding and either leave them with Paula, or at the AirBnB or take some home. Kate is keen on collecting plates and glass ware.

An aside: Our local St Marys Community Players staged the Anne of Green Gables play a few years ago and I see Stratford Festival is staging the same in 2025. People love the play.

The drive across the PEI countryside on two lane roads (Trans Canada Highway No. 1) into Charlottetown is through rolling hills and farmland. Not the huge farms we have here in south western Ontario, more like the small farms of my youth in Grey County. The red dirt and potato farms, after Anne with an E, are what make this island famous.

The other thing that makes this part of the world famous is Lobster. Kate has investigated and determined that the best lobster in Charlottetown is downtown, in the old city, near the harbor at a place called the Water Prince Corner Shop and Lobster Pound (at Water & Prince) and that's where we're going. When we arrive we see there's a huge cruise ship, the Emerald Princess, in the harbor and discover that this tiny restaurant is quite busy with a waiting list to get in. Charlottetown has a population around 40K, this boat probably holds 3K or more. Clearly the harbor area is going to be busy while that boat is here.

Another aside: on our Alaska Cruise (2015), when we stopped at Ketchikan (population around 8K), there were 5 cruise boats of a similar size docked all at once! How do these small port towns survive the onslaught of so many tourists?

So we decide to join the wait list for table. The greeter takes our name and tells us a table should be ready in an hour or so. Kate explores the nearby Market Building and waits with the car; I go for a bit of a march to explore the town and take some photos. I walk down to the waterfront where there's a large green space at Confederation Landing. There are lots of ocean side restaurants, it's a lovely day, but they're all pretty busy with the guests from the Emerald Princess. Around the waterfront a bit is an area called Peake's Quay (with Dave's Lobster and COWS Peakes) with many more restaurants and shops. From there, along George Street, I find my way to St Dunstan's Basilica and at the top of the street is the PEI Parliament. Unfortunately the Parliament building is under renovation so there's not much to see there. 

Across the street from the Basilica there's a statue of two guys chatting, the John Hamilton Greys statues, which recreates a fictionalized conversation by two characters with the same name who were at the PEI conference that led to the confederation of Canada in 1867. It's life sized and casual; they're talking over a barrel. It's not on a pedestal, it's just there on the sidewalk, so you can join in their discussions should you wish.

While the parliament may be closed for renovations there's still lots of lovely colorful clapboard and sometimes historical homes in the area. When I wend my way back to the restaurant we still wait a bit but in reasonable time are seated inside.

Back at the restaurant we get a small table inside. There are tables on the street, and it was a fine day, but this is where we ended up. It's still very busy so we'll take what we can get. The restaurant is very much a diner kind of place; very casual, no white table clothes, definitely not a "ferny bar" with that trendy "Pierre water". But it's busy and has very good lobster (and other seafood dishes; apparently the chowder is to die for). Kate was talking to a fellow who was working in town, off and on, as a consultant from the US. He said he was spoiled by the lobster here and always comes to this restaurant. He says it's the best he's ever had. He also said he'd like it that he and his wife could be like us when they get old (hey, we're not that old!).

Kate had the lobster roll, Reg had a full lobster dinner that came with a large bowl of mussels as the appetizer. Both were really good; I'm not a mussels fan but these were good. I practiced pulling the musslels apart using the shells as tongs as our No.1 son Chris showed me years ago. The lobster was split and the claw were cracked so, with some instruments, not that hard to tear apart. I don't know if this was the best lobster ever but it was certainly well worth the visit. Kate says I'm nuts for lobster because I like all the drawn butter. She may be right.

Afterwards Kate and I do a little walk about. She's keen to see the parliament buildings even though I've let her know you can't get near. We park 5 blocks down the street near a lovely old Anglican Church, St Paul's, at Princess, Grafton and Church Streets. We walk by the Parliament, Kate manages to get some snaps, and along Richmond Street near the Confederation Arts Center where, surprise, surprise, they're doing some version of Anne with an E (Anne of Green Gables, the musical!). We find a place for Kate to sit near the Arts Center, she's not able to walk very far and has pushed herself too far.

On the way back to get the car I find a small theatre, The Mack, which is showing the "70 Mile Yard Sale". This is a one man stand up comedy routine/story that we had enjoyed this summer at the Here for Now Theatre in Stratford. They described the show as:

"THE 70 MILE YARD SALE If someone was asked to name three things about Prince Edward Island, they’d probably say potatoes, Anne of Green Gables, and potatoes... again. Using a unique blend of storytelling, comedy, and theatre, Justin Shaw sheds light on an interesting facet of Island life that many people from the mainland (or from “away”) probably haven’t heard of. 

WRITTEN BY AND STARRING JUSTIN SHAW"

The story centers around a long standing tradition on PEI where along 70 miles of coastline they hold a very big yard sale each year in late September (see Facebook Page). We have missed it. Loved the Justin Shaw show, if you get a chance to see it, you should.

We took a bit of an alternate route back to the bridge on side roads through the hilly country side and ended up at Chelton Beach Provincial Park; a small park a little to the west of the bridge. The red soil makes for red fields, red roads, red cliffs and a red beach. I'm not sure about tides around here, there wasn't much of a beach when we were there and at this time of year we were pretty much the only folks visiting. There was another couple strolling the shoreline but it was otherwise pretty quiet.

Driving back along the shore there are a few rather grand homes with views of the Northumberland Strait. We saw one rather huge home, turned around, came back, turned around again and were taking pictures of it when the home owner came out to get her mail. She must have thought we were "burglars casing the joint". We stopped at the PEI Alcool store and WC at the bridge and paid our toll before returning home to NB.

There was a lot to see in PEI and I fear we only touched a tiny bit of it. It would have been fun to be part of that 70 Mile Yard Sale, there's lots of history in Charlottetown, and there were several scenic lighthouses we missed. However, we did have a bit of a lobster feed and I can now say I've been to every province except Saskatchewan. We should go back to visit Paula sometime next year when the weather is warmer and the other tourists arrive (like swallows to Capistrano).