Je me souviens
October 2016
Saying goodbye to Nova Scotia and heading toward Maine for the autumn. Traveling on TC-104, we stop at the draw bridge at Port Hasting Nova Scotia to yield a large cargo ship passing underneath. Suddenly, there is a loud rapping on our car window. A bearded man stood next to our car said in a serious tone “Seeing your car from California, had to stop and talk to you! What made you travel so far from home?” Smiles her prettiest and she replied from passenger seat “It’s not the destinations, it’s the journey”. The man cracks a broad smile full of understanding. All of us animatedly sharing many beautiful and exotic places we have been. “Don’t skip PEI, seafood is better and the farmlands scenery different than that of Nova Scotia!” He said firmly. While we were swapping stories, the huge cargo ship passed through the Strait of Canso and the bridge again extended to reconnect the TC-104.
Bid happy trail to both Gary and Connie, the charming Utah couple, and pointed our car toward PEI ferry instead of going to Maine.
Ride on the free ferry for an hour in battling rain, we arrived on one of the largest Canadian islands. You will pay toll leaving PEI eventually. It’s roughly 2,190 square miles is also the smallest province of Canada, and the only province has no land boundary. The pounding wind and heavy rain stopped and unveil a field of undulating red farmland stretch as far as the eyes can see. Beyond the lush green hills and thick tree lines, a short rainbow punctuated the darken sky seems to be welcoming us to the island of Prince Edward.
With the coming of 20mph wind and 45°F cold rain pounding the island, we took shelter in Campbell’s Cove Campground for the night, and later extended for few more nights due to the storm. In the morning, we prepared our locally bought applewood bacon, sunny-sided our eggs and buttered our toast for breakfast out in the enclosed porch. Freshly brewed coffees warm our hands and stomachs, while the freezing rain and wind pounding our shack.
After a few days rest, we head to Basin Head Provincial Park in Souris. The beach is empty now but was packed with people a few months back. Some people will choose to relax on the singing sand and sunbathing, but most elect to jump from 15ft height bridge to the river below. The bonus is strong current will carry them straight out to the Strait, or back into the basin lagoon depending on the tide. Daredevil jumpers will then clamber up the ladders on both sides of the boardwalks and do it all over again. Of course, the jumping is prohibited according to numerous signages, but shouldn’t adults allow to take responsibility for their own action? So, the cool park office has chosen not to enforce the rule.
The eastern and middle regions of PEI have dark red cliffs beach with golden sand to boot. Toss in a few stowaway lobster traps and a flock of sandpipers, the beach will look like a scene from Cast Away. But just look up, and we back to Red Point Provincial Park as there were no red cliffs in the movie.
On our way to North Rustico, We spot an old Scottish pioneer cemetery near St Margaret. Intrigued, we squint at the almost faded tombstone inscriptions, some gravesites dated back to early eighteen-hundredth. The Scottish settlers called home in St Margaret since seventeen-hundredth. Their pioneering tales weaving out of hardships and overcoming adversities and became a thriving agriculture and fishing communities are nothing short of a miracle. Together with other settlers such as the French and the Anglo-Saxon, PEI provides 25% of Canada potatoes from the red fertile land here.
From word of mouth, we visited Blue Mussels Cafe in North Rustico for tasty scallop bruschetta and local sweet fragrance blue mussels. Both appetizers were very good; the bruschetta was perfectly crunchy finger bread top with melted mozzarella cheese, chunky scallops, bacon bits, diced tomato, and garnish with chopped parsley. The blue mussels are to die for; soft, sweet, fragrance from thin slices of carrot and zucchini, perfectly seasoned, and the soup from the young mussels even tastier.
Whet our appetite with blue mussels and scallop bruschetta in North Rustico, we drove to Glasgow Glen Farm about 4 miles for our entree. Looking at their stack and stack of firewood out in front, it looks very serious about keeping the pizza oven burning hot. Went in and order the Hawaiian and absolutely in love with its thin crunchy crust, generous tomato sauce on the pizza, sweet and sour chunky pineapple, smoky Gouda, and the ham, oh yes, the ham is the thick slides of (Black Forest perhaps) ham were very tasty. Unfortunately, their customer service attitude on the borderline of being rude; never greet customer, nor step up to take our order, all the while all the workers just chatting among themselves and never shown any interest to whoever comes in.
The idea of walking on Brackley Beach Park near Charlottetown is very appealing to us; fresh ocean air and the easy walking beach has a rejuvenating effect after a big lunch. The red sand on this beach is dense and smooth for miles and miles, which make casual strolling is an absolute joy. The park even builds boardwalks over the dunes to make dune climbing a breeze. We learned that the park got its name from island legislative council clerk who has drowned here long ago.
Near Brackley Beach, one can find Dunes Studio Gallery nearby which is free to everyone. The studio has an edible garden in the back as well as one-of-a-kind chair sculptures placed throughout the garden. Slowly walking through the beautiful garden, we have the feeling that we’re in the middle of The Persistence of Memory painting by Salvador Dali, but instead of melted clocks, they were melted chairs and outdoor wooden furniture.
One of must visit in PEI was the Bottle Houses in Wellington. As the story goes, an acadian (descendant of French Colonist) named Edouard Arsennault, an avid dreamer and recycler way ahead of his time. He collected wine bottle, meticulously removed the label on each, cleaned and save all bottles for something extraordinary. After years of collecting, Edouard builds his first six-gabled house in 1980 when he was 66 years old. Spending more than 45 minutes in this special place, one can feel peaceful and contended came over when the afternoon sunlight streaming through multicolored bottles that surrounding us.
His second creation in 1982 was The Tavern built with more than 8,000 bottles, then on to his last creation in 1983, The Chapel, built with more than 10,000 bottles that included the pews and altar. After 4 years, he completed 3 houses using over 25,000 bottles before his sudden death in 1983.
One of our culinary destination on PEI was very special, and we think you would agree. On early December 2011 morning, Summerside firefighters were called to Queen’s Wharf to battle a burning blaze on JMK Fish Mart. The fire totally and destroyed the beloved seafood shack, as well as another bait shop a way down the Holman’s Wharf. “The stock, everything. Everything is gone” Sandra the shack owner said. “A lot of memorabilia items that his (Bruce’s) grandfather had given him from his days of fishing, a lot of things that we can’t get back or rebuild. That’s the saddest part” she added. Many local heartfelt supports came pouring in. Risen from the ashes in just 5 months, Sander and Bruce rebuilt the fish mart and officially open in May the following year. We were strolling around the restaurant and absorb their tales and moved by their determinations.
Blink of an eye, the 2 dozen oysters on half-shell disappeared from the ice tray. The bright green oysters have lemon-zest brightness, clean flavored, and very tasty. We also ordered 1 boiled 1.75lbs lobster for the main course.
The house-secret sauce boiled lobster serves with claws cracked, tail divided, head served was scrumptious. The lobster meat was soft and sweet even inside the claws. Only in a few minutes, the empty shell of the lobster was all that remain. We didn’t even remember to take pictures! Oh well! Still hungry after the first course, so we ordered another 1.4lbs lobster for dessert, and this time we took the picture.
So, for the duration of our visit here, we have lobster as the main course pretty much every day from dozens of great lobster shacks on the island. Due to the way we traveled, our meals fall into either brunch and lunchner (that’s what we jokingly called our late lunch and early dinner meal!). Although each of our meal geared for what activity we will be doing for that day; it’s usually had the main course and local farm-fresh produces.
After a few weeks of consuming different lobsters daily, we learn to be more selective about what we going to get. It comes down to what is THE best lobster; smaller lobster has more tender meat, hard shell envelopes deeper flavor than soft shell, females have tasty tomalley and males don’t, eating whole lobster is juicier than just eat the tail, and the most obvious one is the house secret boiling sauce, and we stayed away from simple salt/ginger boil. Our lobster choice was green female 1.5-pounder with a hard shell and boiled in house secret sauce for exactly 8 minutes with no rubber bands on claws!
On the return trip to the states, we took the Confederation Bridge back to New Brunswick then heading to Maine. The impressive bridge doesn’t disappoint us with its 8-mile spans across the Northumberland Strait. We learned that the approach bridges (bridge section that connects to land mass) were precast in New Brunswick, main components of the bridge were produced at staging facility on Prince Edward Island, then all sections were assembled over ocean starting in 1993. It took 4 years and 2,079 workers to build the bridge and completed it in 1997.
We enjoyed the PEI trip tremendously, especially with fresh and cheap seafood, one of a kind destinations, colorful histories, and ultra-friendly people. Perhaps one day, we’ll come back to PEI again to explore it in depth, but for now, Maine is calling us.
GPS Coordinates
- Campbell’s Cove Campground – 46°28’32.7″N 62°08’15.1″W
- Basin Head Provincial Park – 46°22’46.3″N 62°06’32.6″W
- Red Point Provincial Park – 46°22’05.7″N 62°07’58.5″W
- St. Margaret of Scotland Pioneer Cemetery – 46°27’43.2″N 62°23’08.5″W
- Blue Mussels Cafe – 46°27’23.4″N 63°17’38.1″W
- Brackley Beach Park – 46°25’45.6″N 63°11’32.7″W
- Dunes Studio Gallery – 46°24’44.1″N 63°11’52.3″W
- Bottle Houses – 46°24’06.8″N 64°06’07.2″W
- JMK Fish Mart – 46°23’26.2″N 63°47’35.8″W
- Confederation Bridge – On PEI side 46°15’01.5″N 63°42’18.3″W, on New Brunswick side 46°09’42.3″N 63°48’54.5″W
References
- Destination details were extracted from respective attraction, hand-out literature/brochure, or website, and Wikipedia
- Coordinates are from Google map in Degrees, Minutes, and Seconds (DMS)