Day Three – Prince Edward Island

Wow. What a great day. I think I’m in love with PEI.



The day dawned sunny and clear, and I headed out from Truro with a glad heart. My concerns about possibly being caught in the morning rush were unfounded – in fact, I hardly saw any cars on the roads all day. I made good time heading northwest into New Brunswick, and headed up the Trans-Canada Highway onto the Confederation Bridge – 13km long, spanning the Northumberland Strait and linking PEI to the mainland.

PEI is gorgeous. Red cliffs, coloured that way by the high iron content. Rolling hills, farmlands, barns, cows, potato fields, and of course the reds and golds of the fall leaves. There seems to be a church every hundred yards, and small cemeteries scattered across the hillsides. On the north side of the island, there is quite the spectacular surf, with red sand beaches and cliffs facing into the Gulf of St Lawrence. I stopped to watch some lobstermen bringing their catch in, and one of them chased after me with a live lobster!!

By 11am, I was standing in front of Green Gables, the original farmhouse used by LM Montgomery for inspiration. I was the ONLY person visiting. This was good however, as all the guides were keen to talk to someone and I got one of them to take a photo of me in front of the house. It’s very well done in the way it recreates the era, and some beautiful antiques are in there too.


I went for a walk in Lovers Lane (wasn’t really feeling it, being on my own an’ all) and the Haunted Wood (yep, that sure was well named). And of course, the gift shop provided some entertaining moments – I very nearly bought a t shirt saying ‘I heart Gilbert’ but then thought it might be misconstrued by men named Gilbert. ‘I heart raspberry cordial’ just didn’t have the right kind of ring to it.

The gift shop attendant also mentioned that Cows Ice Cream has its factory on PEI. This was very welcome news to me! For the uninitiated – Cows Ice Cream has been judged the best IN THE WORLD last year and I’ve had it once before at Whistler. Well, now I was in the CIC heartland... so naturally I had to go pay my respects



And boy, do I have respect for that ice cream. Yummo. Wowie Cowie and Gooey Mooey are my favourites, I’ve decided. Although vanilla is always my fallback. Exciting news – Cows Cheese is also good!!!! Voted best cheddar by the North American Cheese Association last year. (I would have preferred the organisation to be called the North American Cheese Board, but you can’t have everything in life.)

After recovering from my hyperglycaemic coma, I did a little more driving around the island, before heading back to the bridge. Good thing I did it when I did – the winds in the strait had picked up, and already the heavy trucks had been stopped from using the bridge. The car speed limit had dropped to 60km/h, and the attendant at the toll booth told me that the bridge would likely be shut ten minutes after I was waved through. As it was, my poor little rental car got buffeted around a fair bit on the way back to the mainland. Good job I left when I did or I’d be trapped on that godforsaken hellhole forever...

New Brunswick is quite pretty too, what I’ve seen of it from the highway. Lots of empty road and forest. My view out of the motel window is that of Walmart though – not the most scenic view ever, but tempting to go out and stock up on breakfast items for tomorrow. And maybe a chocolate bar.

Next stop – Quebec!!