July 22 PEI Parting moments

Weather - lovely cooler summer days and nice cool nights

Definitely love the cooler weather here!

One night when we were on our way home we saw a horse and its owner walking around in a cove.... just a beautiful simple part of life here on the island.

There was a day as well where we had stopped in North Rustico

which is another quaint fishing village which had a really wonderful Woolen shop with hand knit sweaters, slippers, scarves and mittens.  Everything was locally made and had little tags with the person that made the item.   This was just a great place for me.  If you are a reader and know "The Shipping News"  which won a Pulitzer Prize then seeing the sweater that Quoyle wore was so cool.   And it was hand made and the owner of the shop told me the director ordered 400 more to hand out on the set. 

There are a few other wonderful things in this shop - Thrum mittens which are originally from Labrador and Newfoundland.

And something very dear to me were these little slippers that are an unusual pattern, kind of a boot style with a suede bottom.   Both my boys had these when they were just toddlers,  Nanny made them for them and kind of made her own pattern from seeing them somewhere.   And here they were again!!!!

July 22 PEI Central Shore Beaches

Weather mid 70's to 80, sunny

There are some parks that you have to pay a nominal fee ($7.80) to ride through and the views are like postcards.   They are about 5 miles long and the roads have a parallel bicycle trail. 

Cavendish Park Beach

Brackley Beach

 Bike trails are huge on PEI - there is an old railroad bed that went through the central part of the island and it has been revamped into the Confederation Trail and many visitors do the trail from end to end in about 6 days.  In our campground we had a couple staying right across from us in a small tent and had their bike only.

Biking and Camping

A whole family

July 19 PEI East Coastal Drive

Weather mid 70's sunny

Murray River

In many of the little villages there is little more than a gas station and a general store.  Some are quite antiquated and usually nestled next to a fishing harbour.  If your not fishing here you are growing potatoes!

We had traveled much of the island this week and unfortunately this day had a twist to it late in the afternoon.   Our friend Don had some loud noises from his Harley followed by it not being able to start again.  A local fellow stopped to help and took Don to his house to use a land line~ we were in a no signal zone for the cell phone!   As it turns out the Good Sam road assistance came in handy today, within a half hour a flatbed wrecker came and took the bike to the one and only Harley dealership on the island.

July 18, 21 PEI Red Sand Shores & North Cape

Weather mid 70's today, sunny.   cool at night we shut the windows.

When you come over the bridge and head towards Charlottetown there is an area called the Red Sand Shores.  Boy is it red!   You cannot believe how red the sand is..... when we stopped to walk on the beach the tide was out which was perfect.  Just looked very weird to us !!!

little village of Victoria

Turning the opposite way takes you on a ride through the North Cape Coastal Drive.  Some Acadia influence here, French heritage settlers.  The church we stopped at had a very old cemetary with a beautiful view of the water.  The strange thing was that almost all the stones were either Arsenault or Gallant and a few Poirer.  So basically 3 families seemed to be here, and it looked like they married into each others families too.   Small community?

Farther down the coast there is a fellow that built a house using glass bottles and its a bit of a tourist trap so we snuck a picture of it without paying to go in.  The gardens were beautiful.

Bottle House

Creamy colour flower is Astilbe

July 17 When in Rome, or in PEI !

There two things you have to do when visiting PEI we are told, one is to go to the Lobster Supper at the Church and to a Ceilidh in one of the little community halls.    A Ceilidh (pronounced Kay-lee) is a musical gathering; from the Gaelic tradition.   Both things will not disappoint you. 

Stanley Bridge Community Hall

There were about 80 people packed into this little hall and a local family (2 sisters + 1 brother) played the fiddle, guitar and piano and did stepdancing to reels and other island songs.  At intermission the ladies served strawberries and ice cream in the basement! 

The lobster dinner at the church basement was something started years ago by an enterprising priest to pay off the mortgage.  Ladies donated their time and the fisherman donated the lobsters.  After the mortgage for the parish was paid it was carried on and has become an island tradition.  The dinner is seafood chowder, ceasar salad, blue mussels, lobster, dessert & coffee.  You don't go home hungry!   I couldn't eat till 3 o'clock the next day I was so stuffed.

St. Anne's Church - Lobster dinners in the basement

July 17 PEI Green Gables Area

Weather  Warm and fog can roll in off the water.  about 75, sun out later in day.

Green Gables is a pretty area, little roads and hilly land with rolling fields that open onto quaint little fishing villages and water inlets.  Everywhere you turn there are potato fields in bloom.  It was warm overnight and in the morning when we drove along the coast the fog rolled in giving it a beautiful softness.

There are no "live" lobsters in there !

July 16 Prince Edward Island

Weather  low 80's a little rainshower

To get to PEI by motor home we chose to take the Confederation Bridge from New Brunswick across the Northumberland Strait.  The bridge is fairly new (1997) and cost $1.3 billion dollars; now we understand why one of the locals said they could have had a Space Shuttle!

There is no charge to get onto the island but you pay a toll when you leave - either you take the bridge at $44.25 + $7.25 per extra axle or there is a ferry from PEI to Nova Scotia  if that direction is better suited to your next destination.  Ferry for us would be $107 and in busy season you need to reserve and make it there at a scheduled departure time.  We will take the bridge as a ferry ride is something we have not worked up the courage to do yet!  The bridge is quite a site at 8 miles long - see the hump and curve in the middle???

View from land on PEI - taken from motorcycle later in week

Our campsite destination is the opposite side of the island in the Green Gables area at the KOA in Cavendish.  It's central to the island and will be our home base for the week to ride and explore.

Don & Annie &Buddy         Billy & Rosey

July 15, Shediac, New Brunswick

Weather   sunny and 70ish, beautiful day

There are so many beautiful vegetable gardens Nanny would just love them!   Perfect straight rows, no weeds and you can tell they spend a lot of time in them.   Almost every house has one.  We noticed it in Gaspe as well as here in New Brunswick.

There are a couple of funny things too!  In Shediac many of the fisherman have their boat out of the water beside their homes, doing maintenance.... but it looks funny instead of a car!




Our rv park was great and there were many seasonal sites that were well done and not "trailer trashy".   This one Billy loved being a Canadiens fan - 'VIVA LE CANADIENS.   Priceless.

July 14, Acadia Scenic Coast

Weather was supposed to be sunny and 70's but turned Overcast and cool

The eastern coast of New Brunswick is filled with small villages along the coast where seafood is abundant.   Lots of little snack bars to get lobster rolls, crab rolls, deep fried clams and shrimp.   I had my first ever lobster roll and it was delicious.

There is a Woodcarver's shop where the owner carved a ship on the front and back of his place.   He's a very eccentric fellow and glad to have a chat with you while he shows you his desk that has multiple drawers that open and even a Tim Horton's cup carved into it!

Does the Buddy look like Don or does Don look like Buddy?  lol :)

July 13 Going south to Shediac, New Brunswick

Weather  Sunny and 75F
At the end of today Billy said it must be "Friday the 13th"...... we had 3 faux pas today :)
First one:  We crossed at Pointe a la Croix, Quebec to Campbellton, New Brunswick and Lola started flashing "driver discretion"  which is not good.   So what were we getting into?  Once over the bridge immediately there was a low clearance rail bridge of 3.6 m which is 11 feet 8 inches.   We walkie talkied to our fearless leader "we have a big problem - we cannot go through"; we are 3.75 m (12' 4") so we made a quick right turn away from this and then let Lola take over and redirect us through town to avoid the problem.   She did great and we were so happy we had her.  Definitely worth her cost today!!!
Second one: Along the truck route we struggled trying to find rest areas so we took one of the exits that showed a picnic bench and fuel stop which led us to a small village.   There are many secondary roads along the Acadia Coast have small wooden bridges over the rivers with a low tonnage allowance of usually 5 ton and possible height restrictions.   We went through one that was 3.7m so we took the center but we held our breath as our total weight in the coach is 16 ton!!!!! 

Third one:  Almost to the campground when a stone hit the window and between all the bugs we were hoping nothing caused a crack.  Cross your fingers xxx.   Once we landed at our campground which is the South Cove Golf & Campground (very nice little place)  Billy cleaned our front off for the day and sure enough there was a nasty stone chip that needs repairing.   Lucky for us our friends are connected to windshield glass repair services and are having someone come right to our site when we get to PEI.
1-800-call our insurance guy!!!

July 11, 12 Gaspe Peninsula

Weather Sunny and Windy about 70

Our campground is a new municipal endeavour New Richmond - Camping de la Pointe Taylor, easy in and out sites and so peaceful.  The tricky part is trying to find sites on the internet or in your camping guides for big rigs.  Most you find you have to hit the translate button too, when I called they did speak some broken English and our sites were here when we got here!
Riding out to the end of the Gaspe peninsula is a long day.

Wild Roses grow along the roadside all the way

We went to Perce to see "The Rock" and then went to the town of Gaspe and turned around and came back the same road.   There is really only one road so you can't get lost!   The road follows the coastline and the water made it cooler so we had our leathers on even though we took sun all day.

If you come into Perce in a Motorhome from the north - BEWARE - there is a 17% grade with a turn as well taking you into town!!!!   We did it on the motorcycle and both of us were cringing of the though of doing it in a motorhome.... no way!

from the north going into Perce 17% grade with little shoulder

July 10 Following the St. Lawrence then South Hwy 132

Weather Sunny about 70 degrees

Our friends have a good set of walkie talkies and we have found them extremely useful when traveling in a convoy and letting each other know about traffic and when one of us wants to stop and even helping each with directions.  We both have Magellan GPS' and have found they both tend to get their left and rights mixed up. What's with that???   Oh and just to spice it up a little bit in the province of Quebec all the signs are in French - no English!  Hey what happened to having bilingual signs? So it just makes traveling with these big rigs that much more interesting.   I load our destination every night in the GPS and double check it to our map for the main roads and then double check the final last few turns to the campground to Map quest on the Internet.   Sounds like I am over doing, I know but it is worth it.
From Quebec City we traveled along the St. Lawrence River `on Hwy 20 East then turned south on Hwy 132.  This stretch is a very scenic drive along a river all the way.

 

July 8, 9 Vieux-Quebec, Quebec

Weather Sunny 80 F/ 26 C low humidity - Beautiful Day in a Beautiful City
We traveled and stayed just on the south side of the St. Lawrence River in the KOA; is the nicest one we have visited yet and also the most expensive campground at $65 per night.  The location is very convenient and you can for a nominal cost take the shuttle to the old walled city founded in 1608 by Samuel de Champlain.   Oh the public school history is coming back to us now as we spend the day site seeing!  We were definitely very proud to be "Canadian" today, this is one of the most beautiful old cities in North America.  If you close your eyes and think of being in the 18th century the massive defensive wall on the high bluff would have been nearly impregnable ....but history tells us that the British General Wolfe flanked the city and attacked from the west on the Plains of Abraham to capture it in 1759.  You have to see this wall and imagine the time and labour it must have taken to build  at that time only to be overthrown, the irony of it is overwhelming.

The Perimeter Wall

 The wall covers 3.5 miles around the Old City and inside are some amazing old buildings and homes all covered with beautiful hanging flowers and window boxes. 

Looking up at the Chateau Frontenac from Lower town

Many are now converted to art shops, boutiques, restaurants, bars, and some private homes too.  Cobble stone streets and alleys and many one ways connect the antique urban center and the best way to see it all is just by walking. 

Basilica Cathedral of Notre Dame de Quebec.

Flower Columns outside Basilica

Chateau Frontenac

We will visit again and wish now that we had not waited to see such a wonderful place.  This is a designated World Heritage Site by UNESCO and only 689 miles from home :)