The Road Goes On…

Category: Trips

  • Stanley Bridge, PE to Alberton, PE

    We started the morning with scones and coffee/tea at the former church where we had been for last night’s music performance. The place was bustling and the all female staff was busy keeping up with freshly baked goods constantly being brought out of the kitchen to the display cases to be sold immediately. All this was done with big smiles and conversations with customers.

    We met another couple, also from Ontario, and talked about travels and solar panels. The husband works for a company manufacturing solar panels and it was good to pick his brain about systems we’re considering for our house. We’re glad he took his time to help.

    We continued on the Green Gables Shore Drive until we arrived at Kensington where a railway previously existed that is featured in the Anne of Green Gables story. The site was designated as one of the Island’s National Historic Sites in 1978 and now features restaurants and artist run shops in the former train station and associated buildings and a parked old train engine nearby.

    Next up was the Green Gables Alpacas farm (46.55717N, 63.87413W) where we visited with many of the 35 alpacas that live there. A few could even be fed bits of carrots. We learned about the shearing of their fibres, how it is processed, felt the differences in quality of fibre from different alpacas and finally learned how to spin it into yarn.

    Hungry, we drove to Backwoods Burger (46.57662N, 63.92898W) where we each had a two patty Dam burger. It was damn delicious!

    With no WIFI available, we were forced to talk to each other… 😀

    Our home for tonight is the Jacques Cartier Provincial Park and campground (46.84954N, 64.01306W). The lovely red sandy beach was too inviting to pass up so we took the opportunity to go for a swim.

  • Summerside, PE to Stanley Bridge, PE

    We woke up to bright sunshine and walked around the campground. The mosquitos were gone and the tide on the Northumberland Strait was high. The campsites directly on the water have a great view.

    One of the RVs in the campground was a really old unit from the 1970s that had been refurbished 3-4 times. The owners told us that they were here for car racing the next day at nearby Slemon Park and that visitors were welcome to watch. They would be racing a yellow 1970s Mini. The Slemon Park is on the grounds of what used to be a military base and it is still an active airport. For today, part of apron was blocked off for the races. Cars of all types were there, including Corvettes, Mustangs, BMWs and one yellow Mini as promised. These cars are mostly street cars, although there were lots of stacks of tires around, perhaps to improve racing performance. Next to one car was a stack of tires and a child seat, so perhaps that was the daily driver.

    Father and son-in-law were taking turns driving the Mini as the son-in-law’s car had a broken oil pump.

    The Mini was making some squealing sounds and at lunch that was further investigated by both father and son-in-law. The initial thought was that the alternator belt was the cause so that alternator was adjusted slightly but further investigation determined the cause to be air leaking around one of the air filters on one of the two carburetors.

    The wives were cheering during the races and looking after the three dogs.

    A static aircraft display and memorial is by the entrance to Slemon Park and we were able to walk around. Some of the aircraft had been built by Dehavilland or Canadair.

    This CP-107 Argus was used for antisubmarine warfare and was built at the Canadair factory in Montreal near where Martin grew up sometime between 1957 and 1960.

    We returned to Summerside and walked along the boardwalk and watched a Coast Guard ship come into port.

    Further along the boardwalk we discovered artist shops and the Shoreline Design PEI jewelry shop where Joe was making new creations in the workshop. He took a Canadian penny and punched a hole in it and then transformed it into a ring which he gave Ruth as a gift.

    A short distance further is the MaiYa Pearls store where we talked to Claus about politics, culture and many other subjects. The store is named after his beautiful daughter.

    We enjoyed two huge ice cream scoops to some live music before moving on to Stanley Bridge for a Ceilidh (a music performance). The Proud Islanders were playing in an old United Church to a small but interesting audience comprised largely of tourists. We learned quite a bit about Maritime life through the songs and stories told.

  • Moncton, NB to Summerside, PE

    Today is Saturday and the Moncton Farmer’s Market is open and worth a trip to. We recognized some of the stands from our 2019 visit and found some new ones as well. There are a number of craft stands with jewelry, leather goods, toys, minerals and fossils, and wooden creations. Other stands had freshly made pastries, bread and meals while another hall had fruits, vegetables, meats and, of course, seafood. We bought some pastries and ate them outside where a musician played guitar and sang. A refreshing cold raspberry lemonade helped cool us off on this hot and humid day.

    On our way out we found a stand that was selling cooling “scarves” that you wet and hang around your neck. Very effective today!

    We found the Pumphouse brewery a couple of hundred metres from the market and purchased a six pack of the blueberry beer we had had yesterday to take home.

    We haven’t been to Prince Edward Island for a while so we crossed the Confederation Bridge and stopped at the information centre to see what we should see and do while on the island. Kevin was a great help and probably gave us suggestions for several weeks of activities and sightseeing. We may not make it to Nova Scotia at this rate.

    While we had a large stack of brochures and a map, we found the roadside signage great as it gave ample warning of upcoming attractions, the first of which was the Thompson’s Woodcraft workshop (46.37375N, 63.72876W). Wilfred Thompson is an accomplished woodworker with over 50 years of experience. He turns beautiful wood bowls, and when we told him we’d just started turning wood ourselves, he gave us a tour of his workshop and a couple of tips on bowl making. What a delightful experience.

    We’re staying at the Linkletter Provincial Park, which is right on the water and features mosquitos. Nonetheless we had a great walk along the beach.

  • Moncton, NB

    Today was a restful day at the USVA spa, alternating between saunas or steam baths, and then ice cold water, either from buckets above or a small dipping pool with a small waterfall. After the shock of the cold water, we relaxed for 20 minutes, mostly in hammocks before repeating the cycle once again. After five cycles, we were hungry and set out to find a place to eat.

    Skipper Jacks ended up being the place for dinner. We’d been there on our 2019 trip and really enjoyed it, so why not return? The fish and chips meal was great and we topped it off with cheese cake. We had a Pumphouse blueberry beer with our meal and it was really refreshing. We’ll have to find some to take home.

  • Lameque, NB to Moncton, NB

    We woke up to grey skies with clouds that might pour rain and the mosquitos loved Ruth dearly. She did not respond in kind.

    We continued on the Acadian Coastal Drive hoping to find something interesting to see or do, but alas, today we didn’t find anything.

    We stopped in Miramichi for lunch at Boston Pizza for their $15 lunch special comprised of an entree, salad and drink.

    Some of the roads were in pretty bad condition and then the rain started. Our idea of staying at the Kouchibouguac National Park didn’t seem to make sense given the volume of rain.

    We decided to head to Moncton where we got our Costco fix including gas and then headed to Walmart to join the rest of the camper vans.

  • Caraquet, NB to Lameque, NB

    Today we drove to the end of Hwy 113 where the Miscou Lighthouse is located. What a wonderful spot to have a chocolate croissant, latte macchiato and a smoothie, sitting on a terrace overlooking the Gulf of Lawrence in full sunshine. Even better when there’s a dog on the terrace.

    Freshly energized, it was time to climb up the lighthouse, learning about the history of not only the lighthouse, but the various churches in the area and even about the emergency landing of a Russian aircraft in 1939 on the first non-stop flight attempt from Moscow to New York.

    The Miscou lighthouse (48.00928N, 64.49293W) itself was built in 1856 and is one of the oldest in the Gulf of St. Lawrence region.

    We walked along the beach, collected stones and watched the fishermen, some of whom were having pretty good luck.

    On our way down from we stopped at the Miscou Island Interpretive Peat Bog Boardwalk (47.96393N, 64.52968W) where we learned about bogs and the plants that live in this acidic environment.

    Fascinating were the carnivorous plants. We saw a whole moose get eaten… not really, but the bugs do succumb. Seems fair since the bugs ate us too.

    The Saint-CĂ©cile church (47.87130N, 64.63664W) hosts a baroque music festival each year which we missed by a few days. We were able to see the inside of this rather unique church.

    We decided to go to Camping Lameque (47.814657N, 64.691869W), a paid campground, tonight to do laundry and some cleaning.

  • St. SimĂ©on-de-Bonaventure, QC to Caraquet, NB

    After spending almost two weeks in Quebec, it was time to move onto the next province – New Brunswick in our case. On our 2019 trip we had discovered the Fromagerie Les Blancs d’Acadie (47.77444N, 64.99578W) and enjoyed their fresh cheese curds. They were so fresh that we saw them come out of the basin and they were still warm! This time was no different and we got to sample them again.

    We picked up a big bag of fresh curds and some other types of cheese that we were able to sample.

    A short drive further is Le Carrefour de la Mer which is a recreational and cultural centre right by the marina. It has a performing arts centre, a couple of restaurants, artist run shops and walking paths along the bay. One of the artists made woodcut prints on paper he had made himself.

    We enjoyed a nice beer on the patio and walked along the boardwalk at sunset, ending the day with a chocolate dipped ice cream.

  • Cap-Chat, QC to St. SimĂ©on-de-Bonaventure, QC

    After a brief stop at the Metro grocery store to buy groceries we travelled down Hwy 299 for a new adventure. Near the junction of Hwy 299 and the Murdochville road, there is the Mont Lyall Agate Mine (48.80427N, 66.08610W) where we prospected for geodes and agate after a brief training session of what to look for and which types were no good.

    It was very hot and humid and hard work, but in the end we used our pick hammers and dug up some rocks to take down to the stone cutter who told us which ones were promising and cut those open for us. After all the hard work, we had three rocks that were good.

    A nearby stream of cold, fresh water helped cool us down and reversed the effects of heat exhaustion.

    On our east coast trip in 2019 we discovered Ferme Bourdages (48.07730N, 65.59403W) which had the best strawberries we’ve ever had. It was time to pay them a visit again, but alas, no strawberries available this time. It was disappointing, but a strawberry vine and strawberry pie would have to do. The pie survived about half an hour while the vine will be coming home with us.

    To our great surprise, the farm offers full-featured free overnight camping with toilets, showers, laundry, dump station and even electricity.

    We met a German couple with a licence plate starting with MG which is the Mönchengladbach area in Germany where Ruth is originally from. They were just finishing three months of touring eastern Canada in the 18 year old RV that they had shipped over from Germany and that was having some mechanical problems, so we hope they make it back to Halifax so it can be shipped home.

  • Cap Chat, QC

    After breakfast we left our great campground and drove to Projet Éole, a wind farm nearby which has the world’s largest vertical axis wind turbine. This was built as a research project in the 1980s to study and improve the efficiency of wind mills. The wind mill was commissioned in 1987 and shut down in 1993 as the efficiency of horizontal wind turbines improved.

    The wind mill is 110 metres high with a 350 ton rotor and 100 ton alternator, producing 3.8 megawatts of power. The two guides were terrific and provided lots of information, both technical and historical.

    The next major stop was at Couleur Chocolat in nearby St. Anne des Monts for ice cream and blueberry sorbet dipped in dark chocolate. The chocolatier, Carl Pelletier, is a very precise man and creates many diverse types of chocolate goodies, four of which joined us on our trip. Three remain.

    Exploramer is an interactive museum about the St. Lawrence and the fascinating life that exists within its waters. We learned so much about invertibrates such as squid and octopus. Did you know that octopuses have three hearts and blue blood? Now you do!

    At 3:30, there was an interactive learning event with touching various sea creatures like starfish, sea urchins and lobsters.

    It is definitely worth a visit!

    The last stop for today was the glass blower Le Cueilleur de Verre. We had seen some of his work at Exploramer but he has even nicer marine life inspired pieces in his workshop, and we were unable to resist taking home a memory.

    It was getting late and we hadn’t made it very far, so we decided to return to the Phare Cap Chat campground for another night. We received a very friendly welcome.

    Before going to sleep we walked down to the waterfront and along the beach.

  • Rimouski, QC to Cap-Chat, QC

    Today’s highlight was visiting the Empress of Ireland Museum. The Empress of Ireland was an ocean liner that sank in 1914 after colliding with a coal ship Storstad in dense fog. The Empress of Ireland sank in 14 minutes and 1012 of the 1477 people aboard died. William Clark, who worked on the Titanic and survived her sinking, also worked on the Empress of Ireland and survived her sinking.

    The museum has a large number of artifacts recovered from the wreck on display.

    Some of the display tables are made from teak planks recovered from the ship. A history study from McGill, who is worked at the museum for the summer, gave us some interesting extra bits of information. One of the displays features the brass letters of the ship’s name from the stern of the ship. All of the letters except for the ‘D’ in ‘IRELAND’ are solid brass. The original ‘D’ must have been lost or damaged and was replaced with a brass sheet affixed to cork.

    The wreck site, in 45m of water off the coast was designated a historic site which protects further artifacts from being removed. Many divers have done this very challenging dive and five have lost their lives in the process.

    Now hungry, we stopped for croissants and coffee and tea at a local bakery.

    Tonight we are staying at the Phare Cap Chat campground featuring a working lighthouse, a beautiful view of the St. Lawrence, walkways and tree. The folks running the campground are really welcoming and supportive and the sites are very reasonably priced.