PEI Day 5

Went for a drive, found a new beach on the south side of the island (____ point... my memory is very bad), family swam while I took photos. Honestly, The rest of the day really faded in to the background after tonight’s visit to a local Ceilidh (I’ve seen it spelled so many ways... all that’s important is that it is pronounced kay-lee).








I couldn’t tell you what a classic ceilidh is, all I know is that I’ve wanted to go to one ever since I learned how to pronounce it. Tonight’s event was a sweltering little community hall packed with 150-200 people (mostly tourists... I want to meet more locals) and a small stage at the front, just large enough for the three musicians who would play throughout the night. The ‘big’ act was Cynthia MacLeod, a very talented (and rather beautiful) fiddler. She was accompanied on guitar and vocals by a fellow whose name escapes me at the moment. The ‘special guest’ for the evening was a school teacher from the island who played solo (guitar and mouth organ) and with the other two throughout the night. The atmosphere is very relaxed, requests are encouraged and humour is infused throughout the night. But the music, oh the music, is what we came for and it certainly did not disappoint. Celtic, Island, East Coast... whatever you want to call it, that’s what it was. The floor pulsed as 150 feet tapped in unison, the fiddle rang out clear, the guitars (6 and 12 string) were masterfully played, and the drum (Beran?) was just plain cool (I’ve always wanted to learn to play one of these drums). Marri-Mac, Oh Danny Boy, Lord of the Dance, Rigadoon, The Phantom Ship of the Northumberland (????) Strait, and many other classics kept me smiling. With Ceilidhs happening on Mondays and Wednesdays in Brackley, and Tuesday and Thursday in Stanhope, I see the opportunity to attend at least five more of these before I go. I doubt I’ll make them all... but I’ll try, be assured of that.

PEI Day 4

Woke up ‘early’ today. The family knocked on my door at 10:45AM to let me know that they were heading out to the beach to go swimming. Jellyfish were still around, there is talk of relocating our family’s swimming activities to the south shore.

Today was a day without much of an agenda. We went for a nice long road, working towards my personal goal of exploring every single highway, byway, and driveway on this island. Lots of houses and lots for sale; Though no prices were listed, the trends would suggest that we could buy a huge house on a huge lot overlooking an ocean cove for considerably less than what we could sell our house in Calgary for. To put it bluntly: I’m 90% convinced that if I can find solid work out here, I’m packing my belongings and heading east permanently. I love this place.
I went over to the nearest internet connection (a little shop at the entrance to the provincial park we are in) in order to upload all of the journal/blog entries and photos of the last few days. I paid $4.00 for half an hour on a particularly glitchy internet connection and only managed to get day one and part of day two up in some semblance of their proper order (I’ve been writing and laying-out rough versions these posts every evening at the cottage, it takes a bit of work to make blogger.com do what I want). Day three, four, and five, as well as edited versions of one and two, will likely come when I head in to Charlottetown and find a nice coffee shop to connect from.

I’m not particularly proud of today’s crop of photos. Most were captured as we were driving down roads much too small to safely pull over. All I will post for today is a lupin. These are purple flowers that inhabit many of the fields and ditches across the island. It seems to be the fifth color in the island color scheme (earth red, potato-plant green, ocean blue, sky blue, pupin purple). I hope to redeem myself with some better shots of the little houses, blue bays, and rolling fields over the next few days. Morning light seems to be what most of these scenes need, unfortunately this means waking up earlier than 10am...




Dad and I went to the beach at 10:30 tonight. Oddly enough, it was too bright for really good star-gazing or fox hunting. Once our eyes adjusted, the waxing moon (sitting about 35-40 degrees above the horizon) was casting strong shadows across the beach and making it nearly impossible to look south without losing our night vision. Normally the solution would be to wait for it to set, but this might take a while. It is midnight right now and the moon is still blazing bright in the sky. With it being in its waxing stage, we may find that the completely dark star-gazing may evade for most of the rest of the trip, the moon likely becoming full at some point in the next week or so. Not good for star gazing, but it certainly was beautiful with the glowing moon and clouds silhouetting the rugged dunes.

In past trips, the foxes have been a pleasant addition to our daily events. Evening walks often include one of the red and white creatures running across the path or eerily staring out from the bushes, only being seen as two points of light when our flashlight happens to catch their eyes. We saw some eyes and heard some noises when we were down on the beach, but we never actually saw our quarry in all of its furry majesty. But as we were driving back, I did catch some eyes on the side of the road. After some particularly skillful and dangerous (at any other time of the day in any place other than here) driving in reverse by my father we set our headlights and flashlights on a fox-like creature. To me it seemed longer and thinner than our usual foxes, and it was either very dark brown or black with white only on the tip of its tail. Also unlike the foxes, it’s eye glow shifted with the angle from the familiar white/yellow to an (I’ve got to admit) slightly more menacing orange/red. Hope to talk to a park ranger at some point this week and find out what this may have been. In Alberta, we’re used to having a plethora or mammals around us; As I remarked in the car on the way back, a book called “The Mammals of PEI” would be about ten pages long, three of those being varieties of cows, four being varieties of mice and voles, an entry for the coyotes, and entry for the foxes, and an entry for our mystery creature. I love this island, but the Rockies it is not when it comes to ecological diversity.

PEI Day 3

The call of Harry Potter necessitated another trip in to Charlottetown. Also allowed for a booze run (I feel comfortable saying that only because most of the people reading this know how unlikely I am to “get my drink on”).

I didn’t hit our beach today, got back from the Charlottetown excursion and simply felt like lazing around (it is a vacation after all). Dad and Laura tried to go swimming but the jellyfish had invaded over night, ruining their plans.

The highlight of the day was a dinner at New Glasgow. Now, of course, the major draw was the prospect of bottomless clam chowder, bottomless steamed mussels, and a perfectly prepared 2lb lobster (I went small... I’m getting the 3lb next week); But one must mention that New Glasgow sits on the banks of the Hunter river, one of the most picturesque locations I have ever visited. My adjective bank is limited when it comes to PEI as it is not a particular quality in the sights that makes them so notable; It is the quantity of the those qualities that makes the scene what it is. The greens are so green in the trees, the grass, and the crops. The blues are so blue in the ocean, the river, and the sky. And the red dirt is such an absolutely rich red. None of these render well enough in photos or in words to accurately convey the beauty which they combine to make. Toss in the rustic homes nestled in amongst the groves of trees on the banks of the river and you have got yourself an absolutely perfect scene (unfortunately the light was all wrong for a photo... I hope to go back one of these mornings and capture the scene closer to what I actually saw).






After dinner we drove north (through some beautiful farmland) to the cliffs at Cavendish, arriving just in time to watch the sunset. I’m a sucker for sunsets, they take up a good portion of my personal photo collection, but I can honestly say that this easily ranks as one of the most beautiful sunsets that I have ever seen. I have the distinct honor of watching the sun drop behind the Rocky Mountains every evening, a beautiful sight without a doubt, but to watch the sun sink over the Gulf of St. Lawrence is an entirely different experience altogether, one that I hope to experience many more times before I’m dragged away from this place, kicking and screaming.

PEI Day 2

My internal clock is in absolute disarray. Forced myself to go to bed at 11:00 last night, but the fact that this was 8:00 in Calgary meant that I lay awake for a while. It was a restless night.

We took a trip in to Charlottetown to get some groceries. I was intrigued to learn that our Sunday shopping trip was something that, until very recently, would have been impossible on the island. There is something very civilized about a mandated slowdown of life for one day a week. I also learned that Sobey’s, a relatively new sight in Alberta, was started in the atlantic provinces more than a century ago?

Prince Edward Island is a rural experience. I think the best example of this so far is the method by which we buy potatoes. Driving back from Charlottetown, we decided that we wanted some “New PEI Potatoes” (tiny potatoes with the most rich flavour and pleasant texture). We pass a sign on the road that advertises just that and begin looking for the farmer and his truck parked by the side of the road... No such luck. Upon closer examination, we realize that what we thought was a sign is actually a large wooden box with a hand-written “Self-Serve” sign on top. The instructions written on it are simple: open the lid, deposit $____ in to the money container, pull out your ____lb bag of potatoes. That absolutely made my day.

I’d like to introduce you to Tamarack Cottage, our home for the next two weeks. It is one of approximately ten cottages on the property of Windermere Cottages. My father’s family has been coming to these cottages with some regularity for more than ____ years. The floors/tables/nightstands/dressers are slanted, the wallpaper is stapled where it has peeled, the doors only occasionally fit in to their frames, the windows open and close with considerable effort, and the furniture seems to be older than me... but I wouldn’t have it any other way. I’m worried by the For Sale sign that is now sitting at the entrance to the property, I really hope this place doesn’t change too much.





Took an evening walk on ‘our’ beach; I had forgotten how beautiful it is here. The tide was coming in, slowly encroaching on the sand castles of the day. I grabbed some photos of a few of the more creative ones, as well as some of the particularly beautiful views around the area.

We were picked up this morning by our good friend Dawn, how thankful we were for a friend who was actually willing to get us out to the airport for 6:30AM on a Saturday.





Flight was quite ordinary. Calgary to Charlottetown with a transfer in Toronto. Wheels up at 8:00AM MST, rolling on the Charlottetown tarmac at 6:00PM ADT. The latter portion of the flight took us over the western states, providing a beautiful view out the window (when clouds did not obscure) and also a most interesting approach path for the plane. Charlottetown’s main runway runs North/South and, since we had been flying south of the border for the last leg, we simply assumed we would come in from the south and land with our nose to the north. Instead, our plane flew north, passing to the east of Charlottetown and across the entire breadth of the island before completing a sharp turn almost directly over our little north-shore cottage before heading south and landing.


Plane deboarding was delayed by Aerosmith, arriving for a concert this evening where they will play for stadium full of 30,000 fans. I normally wouldn’t bother describing the expected turn-out except for the fact that PEI has a total population of 100,000; An equivalent of 1/3 of the entire island will be at the exhibition grounds this evening. [Got a quick shot of their motorcade as they pulled out of the airport]


Twenty-minute drive from Charlottetown to our rented cottage on the North Shore. Stopped in at Cove Head Bay to pickup dinner. Laura and I both took home a large container of mussels and bowl of hearty seafood chowder. Mom had a scallop burger, and dad had fish ‘n chips. I can’t speak for the rest of the family, but I know that I thoroughly enjoyed my meal. I rank the quality of my mussel eating experience by the amount of sandy sediment at the bottom of the container when I am done (more being better); This meal did not disappoint. As for the seafood chowder, simply know that my spoon could only go about half way down in to the bowl before it was stopped by a hearty helping of scallops, mussels, and fresh PEI potatoes. Delicious.






The sun sets earlier here, it is 8:40PM right now and it is well towards dusk. It was a cloudy day so the sunset is much more gradual through the overcast sky. The mood would be best described as soft, there is nothing harsh about what I am experiencing right now. There are many birds around; There songs seem different, they seem to carry further than they do at home, and with an inherent depth that seems to give an almost dream like quality to the sound.
It’s about 20 degrees outside and, though still humid, it feels wonderful compared to what we left in Calgary. The cool air combined with the faint scent of the sea is intoxicating.
Whether from the plane or out the window of our rental car (Chevy Impala), the view is amazing. Everywhere you look is a farmhouse in the middle of acres of rolling green hills and bright red dirt roads. I enjoy the yellow and green of Alberta’s crop season but it simply does not compare to bright green plans contrasted against the red dirt of the island.
Haven’t been down to the beach yet, but hope to either this evening or tomorrow for the sunset. Be assured that these trips will yield some good photographs.

And just for the sake of interest... check out my awesome firetruck room!