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I had arrived in Quebec City the previous afternoon and much as I liked the look of it, I’d had my fill of cities and museums for a while after St John’s and Ottawa. 

I was now longing to get out into the countryside and a day hiking at Canyon St Anne, looking round the religious theme park in the town of St Anne de Beaupré and viewing Montmorency Falls just outside the city was what I needed.

There are 2 waterfalls not too far from Quebec City, the famous Montmorency Falls are very close by and there are also waterfalls further out at Canyon St Anne.  I decided to go to Canyon St Anne first because it was further away and work my way back towards Quebec City.

It was about a 45 minute drive to Canyon St Anne and I actually passed Montmorency Falls on my way, they’re impossible to miss if you’re driving on the main road towards St Anne de Beaupré.  Canyon St Anne is beyond the town of St Anne de Beaupré and the signs began to appear for the canyon and the parking, although it wasn’t clear whether access to the canyon was open.  I hoped that now it was July, all the summer tourist attractions would be open.

The car park was open and there were enough cars in it for me to conclude that the canyon was accessible today.  There is an entrance fee to access the canyon and a well maintained trail takes you to viewing points to a series of waterfalls and there are also 3 suspension bridges to cross on this trail. 

There was also something called the Air Canyon which is like a chair lift, except it goes a bit faster.  You basically sit in this chair lift and it shoots you across the canyon for a view of the waterfalls and then brings you back again.  It gives you a nice view of the waterfalls, but it is over in seconds.  It’s not remotely scary, if you can go on a chair lift, you can do this.  Compared to a zipline it’s easy.  If you want scary, don’t bother with the Air Canyon.  Canyon St Anne has a much more terrifying option!

I started hiking the trail and following the story of the petraminis who were little coloured goblins who brought rainbows to the canyon.  I think the storyboards were aimed more at children, but I enjoyed reading about the adventures of the different coloured petraminis who defeated the evil giant and each contributed a colour to form a rainbow through the canyon.

I really enjoyed the hiking trail, there were lovely views of the falls which tumble in several stages.  There are 3 bridges to cross which give more viewpoints of the canyon and waterfalls.

The terrifying option available at Canyon St Anne is the Via Ferrata.  I know all about Via Ferrata from my work as a tour guide.  Whilst taking coach loads of tourists through the Dolomites, I would explain that these were an Italian invention first used when mountaineering took off in the Alps. Via Ferrata literally means “iron way” and a series of metal rungs have been drilled into the mountainside as a means of assisted climbing making routes accessible that would otherwise have been too difficult.  The Via Ferrata routes through the Alps were used during the First World War and saved many lives.  In the Dolomites they are, once again, used recreationally by Alpine climbers, but you do need to have proper training and equipment to use them.  It is for entirely this reason that my knowledge of Via Ferrata was purely theoretical, I have neither the equipment nor the training to use the Via Ferrata routes through the Dolomites.  So I had never actually tried Via Ferrata myself.

I’d always thought I’d like to give Via Ferrata a try.  I’d seen it on telly and it looked like the kind of experience an adrenaline junkie like me would thrive on.  And here was my chance to try it, in Canyon St Anne, today!

I’d been watching some people on the course, some of them quite young children, as I walked on the trail.  That was one of the advantages and disadvantages.  It was easy to see the climbers, so you could see how other people were managing on the Via Ferrata course you might like to try.  Conversely it meant if you were on the Via Ferrata route, people hiking on the trail could stand and watch you!

I walked up to the desk where people were kitting up to do the next Via Ferrata course and I asked if there were any spaces.  Most people book online, but you can turn up and see if there are any spots.  As I hadn’t really considered doing the Via Ferrata before I got here, but was happy to spend time at the canyon whether I climbed up the side of the waterfall or not, I hadn’t booked online.  However, as I was a single person, it was easy to slot me in. 

There were several routes ranging from an hour and a half to four hours and they were suitable for children from the age of 6 for the easiest route to 12 year olds on the most difficult route. The Via Ferrata at Canyon St Anne was also advertised as suitable for pensioners.  It was fun for the whole family! 

Sebastian told me there was space for one person and advised the Marmite route which was the easiest one.  All the routes went up the side of the waterfall, but this route went up the left side where there was more rock and you were further away from the water so you didn’t get wet.  I could take my rucksack with me, and therefore also my camera, and it took around 90 minutes to complete.  I took Sebastian’s advice and signed up for this route, which was the course that 6 year olds can do! 

I was relieved that I hadn’t booked online.  If I’d booked online I would have likely decided to challenge myself and signed up to the difficult route for 12 year olds.  And I would never have managed it.  I struggled on the course for 6 year olds!

Our guide was Dario and I was doing the Via Ferrata with two American Chinese couples.  I let all 4 of them go ahead of me and went last.  I’m not athletically gifted and know from previous caving experiences and suchlike, I’m likely to be slow and hold everyone else up.  So I let them all go in front of me. 

Via Ferrata is much more difficult than it looks.  When I’d been watching the participants doing the Marmite course that I was doing, it looked relatively easy.  It wasn’t.  It was extremely difficult.  It was also terrifying!

I’d seen plenty of those tightropes across river gorges on television, the sort where you stand on the bottom rope and hold onto the top one and make your way across.  I’d never had any opportunity to try one before.  The first one seemed to stretch a long way across the canyon.  I stepped on it and edged my way across.  It wasn’t too bad, but it was pretty wobbly.  I don’t know why I’d expected it not to be.  I suppose I must have been thinking it would be a rigid wire.  No, it wasn’t.  I couldn’t believe this was advertised as something 6 year olds and pensioners could do. 

The Marmite Via Ferrata course consisted of climbing metal rungs while being attached to a steel cable drilled into the side of a cliff.  When I had to go down, I was told to come down backwards and hold onto the steel rope, except that meant I couldn’t see either where I was going, or more importantly, where my foot was supposed to go. 

I was useless.  I’d been wise to do the shortest, easiest route, this was hard enough and I was petrified. 

We all had a lifeline and a safety line.  The lifeline was permanently attached to the steel cable, the safety line was there to keep us closer to the cable if we wanted to stop and take photos.  Otherwise the safety line wasn’t attached because it contained a shock absorber, so if we did fall it would very slowly lengthen to break the fall.  I was very careful about attaching the safety line every time I stopped to take photos. 

You’ll be pleased to know that I didn’t fall; I did bash my knees, shins, elbows, forearms and left thigh and ended up with amazing bruises on them all! 

Dario asked if I wanted to do the easy or intermediate route a little further on.  He said the intermediate route wasn’t too bad and he seemed reasonably confident I could do it.  With this encouragement and knowing I was going to be terrified either way, why not challenge myself even if it made me a bit more scared? 

Until I saw the photos I didn’t realise what a climb it was, using the rungs in the more difficult parts and trying to work out which piece of rock you could put your feet on otherwise.  I got stuck quite a few times and Dario had to point out the route.  It still wasn’t easy, but I had some guidance. 

However, at one stage I was faced with a tightrope with no overhead wire.  Again, this was no rigid steel cable, it sagged in the middle with your weight.  Therefore it was impossible to stay upright on the tightrope and keep my balance.  That was where I was going wrong.  The idea here was not to stay upright.  I had to hang onto the cable I was attached to and lean back to get along the tightrope.  Afterwards I recalled that I’d seen that technique on the telly, but I wasn’t thinking straight enough to remember that.  Despite the first tightrope not being too bad, my legs were still shaking uncontrollably when I reached the other side. 

As I came to the last part of the course, predictably the other four had all finished and Dario looked after me to make sure I got to the end of the course in one piece.  He guided me personally and told me his mum wouldn’t do the course, she was too scared.  Even though he did it to make me feel better, he simply succeeded in making me feel really old, I suspected his mother was about the same age as me, because Dario only looked about 20!

I then became aware, as I struggled through the last part of the route, I had an audience.  The viewpoint where I had been standing a couple of hours ago watching the Via Ferrata participants, was now full of new spectators.  People at the legitimate falls viewpoint were observing me fumbling along the cliff at the side of the falls and they were about to watch me do the last tightrope.  Surely this tightrope couldn’t be too bad?  I’d seen really little kids crossing this earlier.  Thankfully this tightrope was short and it was easy.  Even so, you really don’t want people watching you when you’re crossing it, but as I had been guilty of viewing people here, I couldn’t really complain.  I perhaps hadn’t thought this through completely beforehand.  If you don’t want an audience, the trick is to do the Via Ferrata as early as possible before the canyon gets busy. 

I apologised to Dario for being so slow on the course, but he didn’t seem bothered.  The other four were waiting for me and one of the Chinese men said he’d been scared too.  At least I could be proud of myself for doing the more difficult route when given the choice.  I’d done the route unsuitable for children under 10!  What an achievement!

After completing the Via Ferrata course, we then got to do the fun bit, the zipline!  The zipline held no fear for me.  On the other hand, getting to the zipline platform on the short Via Ferrata course was scary!  I went last again, but I didn’t care. 

Sebastian was in control of the zipline and he had plenty of time before he started his next Via Ferrata course, so he had a bit of fun with us, controlling the length and speed of our travel across the zipline with a rope.  Sebastian let out the rope so far and then stopped it, so we could stop in the middle of the zipline over the canyon for a view.  When Sebastian sent me over on the zipline and stopped me in the middle, I was quite happy to dangle over the river on the rope, I didn’t even hold on!  That part was immensely enjoyable and didn’t bother me at all. 

Once over to the far side of the river on the zipline, I had to walk across the bridge and give my harness and helmet back and then I could continue on the hiking trail. 

I was down at the bottom of the trail now, I had descended as far as I could down into the canyon, so now it was an uphill walk on the other side of the river.  As I continued on the walk I saw more people on the Via Ferrata routes.  As well as people on the Marmite course on the opposite side of the river, doing the dry climb up the side of the waterfall like I had done, I also now had a good view of the people on the La Chute course. 

This route went up the opposite side of the waterfall from the Marmite route and was much closer to the water, so the rocks were slippery and the participants got wet!  If I’d seen it online, I’d probably have been stupid enough to book it thinking I could manage it, in reality I don’t think I would have had a chance, especially with wet rock to contend with.  Despite it being suitable for 12 year olds, this was not something this 47 year old felt she would be able to accomplish. 

I stood at a viewpoint looking down and the Via Ferrata climbers were just below, clambering up the slippery, wet rocks.  I watched one large girl with a large chest to match wearing a low cut top being attached to the guide with a rope to make it up this difficult section.  I wondered if she was aware that her wardrobe choice probably hadn’t been the wisest for this particular activity.  At that particular moment in time I imagined it was probably the least of her worries.  I could envisage that if I’d have done this route, the guide would have been attaching me to a rope as well, probably more than once. 

Yet again, I was relieved I hadn’t done anything ridiculous like booking in advance and had waited until I arrived, especially since the 90 minute route I’d done had evidently used muscles that hadn’t had any exercise in years, judging by the fact that for the next 4 days I could barely sit down!  My arms ached from the hanging on, but this was nothing compared to my thigh muscles which had obviously done the majority of the work on this climbing route.  I could hardly get up and down steps and sitting down was absolute agony.  Getting in and out of a low car was especially painful. 

I’d never done anything that had made me hurt so much for so long in my life.  Caving was very punishing and I always got aches and bruises from adventure caving, but it had never been as bad as this.  I couldn’t determine whether this was because Via Ferrata was more demanding on your body or it had been more than 7 years since I’d done adventure caving and my body was less able to cope with these kinds of demands now I was older. 

Yes, this had been my first Via Ferrata course and was also highly likely to be my last.  Those guides who lead those courses every day must be super fit and have leg muscles like iron!

After completing the hiking trail I got back in my car and left Canyon St Anne for the town of St Anne de Beaupré, described in one of my guidebooks as a sort of religious theme park. 

The town of St Anne de Beaupré is dedicated to the saint, who was the Virgin Mary’s mother. St Anne de Beaupré is the second oldest pilgrimage site in North America. The basilica is certainly impressive, a huge building in its own square, it wouldn’t have looked out of place in France.  The basilica is also a lot bigger than any of the churches in Quebec City itself.  As well as an impressive exterior, it is also magnificent inside containing the shrine of St Anne de Beaupré and a huge chapel in the basilica basement. There were several other religious buildings close by the cathedral and also a pathway with the stages of the Way of the Cross depicted by carvings.  This is obviously what was meant by “religious theme park” and actually that was quite a good description. 

I don’t consider myself to be religious, but I did find it all rather moving.  It was impossible not to be touched by the whole package of the basilica, religious buildings and especially the Way of the Cross walk. 

And finally it was time to move on to Montmorency Falls, the place where everyone who stays in Quebec City goes to visit.  I eventually found the parking at the top of the falls. 

I set off on foot to do even more hiking and started off by walking across the suspension bridge at the top of the falls.  At 83m high, Montmorency Falls are higher than Niagara, but they don’t have the same impact as they don’t have the same volume of water.  Montmorency Falls is also a single drop waterfall.  Having looked at some photos, Montmorency Falls look more impressive in winter when snow feeds the side waterfalls and you can walk across the snow to them, although I don’t believe there’s enough snow for that every year.  Nevertheless, they are very powerful. 

I walked down a series of steps to the bottom of the falls.  One viewing platform was soaked because of the spray, so I contented myself with other viewing platforms which were plenty close enough.  I’d managed to avoid getting wet at Canyon St Anne today, I didn’t really want to get wet now.  The bridge at the base of the falls is a lot further away from the falls, but you get a different perspective of them, so I walked to the bridge and then back to the viewing platforms near the bottom of the falls.  Now it was time to haul back up all the steps to the top of the falls to get to my car.  By the time I got to my car I was really tired, but at least it was only a short drive back to Quebec City.

Unfortunately, trying to get to the hotel car park was a nightmare because of all the diversions because of the music festival going on there at the moment.  I was driving round in circles.  Eventually I spoke to a policeman, in French at first, since we were in the French speaking part of Canada and I needed this policeman’s help.  I thought it best to make some sort of effort in his first language.  Although I learnt French at school, I rarely visit France and my French these days is pretty bad.  The policeman could tell I was struggling and asked if I’d prefer to speak in English.  In relief I told him my problem and he let me know what to do to get to my hotel car park.

It was just coincidence I was in Quebec City while the music festival was on; I wasn’t there to attend any events.  The previous night I’d been to a jazz concert because the theatre was selling tickets at a reduced price as I walked past.  The concert was ghastly.  Calling it jazz should have been questioned by trade descriptions, because it wasn’t like any jazz I’d ever heard.  The couple sitting next to me lasted 3 numbers, I walked out at half time with no intention of returning and I wasn’t the only one.  There were only about 40 people in the audience, so it wasn’t like this musician could afford to lose members of the audience!  But you would have had to be a die hard fan to stay to the end, it really was just a horrible noise!

I decided not to risk any further musical events this evening, instead I was going to treat myself to some food and a cocktail at the bar in the famous Chateau Frontenac Hotel.  I didn’t manage to get a table right next to the window in the bar, but I could see out of the window. 

I looked at the cocktail menu and ordered a Penicillin which was made with Scotch, single malt, lemon juice, honey and ginger.  It seemed appropriate that I should be drinking a cocktail called Penicillin after the exercise on the Via Ferrata course, plus all the walking I’d done and the steps I’d climbed today.  I also ordered a cheese plate to enjoy with my Penicillin and relaxed in the surroundings of the opulent Chateau Frontenac bar with Quebec City lit up outside.  After my high intensity day I certainly needed a rest. 

I travelled to Quebec in early July 2018.

Canyon St Anne is located 42km away from Quebec City, an approximate 40 minute drive. You can find details about Canyon St Anne on the website. Canyon St Anne is open from May until October. Entrance fee is $14 for adults and gives access to the hiking trails and bridges at the canyon. The Air Canyon costs an extra $15 per person.

The Via Ferrata trails at Canyon St Anne are operated by Projet Vertical. You can choose from several packages where you can do one course or combine routes. I did the Giant’s Pothole Course and Zipline which was one of the easiest Via Ferrata routes, taking the intermediate line at the fork. I also stayed dry. Prices start from $40 plus tax. It is best to book online in advance to guarantee a place.

The town of St Anne de Beaupré is located 33km from Quebec city, just a half hour drive away. There is a large basilica, several exterior chapels and the Way of the Cross walk in the town.

Montmorency Falls are a 15 minute drive from Quebec City. You can easily see the falls from the road, but for a better view you can stop and walk around. The Falls are accessible year round. There is a charge of around $12 for parking. There is also a cable car which is open all year. In addition there is a zipline and Via Ferrata courses at Montmorency Falls which are open from June to October. Details of all these can be found on the Montmorency Falls website.

Chateau Frontenac is one of the original Canadian Pacific Railway hotels. It is located in the heart of Quebec City and is currently part of the Fairmont Hotels group. You can stay at the hotel or simply have a meal in one of the restaurants or a drink in the bar.

I stayed at Unilofts Grand-Allée in the centre of Quebec City, approximately 10 minutes walk to the historic heart of the city. There is a charge for parking at the hotel.

Check out my posts about my other Canadian adventures.

North Cape Coastal Drive Part 1

North Cape Coastal Drive Part 2

Points East Coastal Drive

Charlottetown – Pocket Capital of Prince Edward Island

Cavendish and the Rotating House of North Rustico

Canada: Saint John River Valley

Canada: Magnetic Hill and Fundy National Park

Canada’s Medieval Castle

Read about other adrenaline fuelled adventures

Greenland: Viewing the Aurora Borealis by Snowmobile

Yorkshire: Gaping Gill Winch Meet

Germany: Paragliding in the Bavarian Alps

Today was my last full day on Prince Edward Island and I had set it aside to explore the most popular part of Prince Edward Island National Park which incorporated Cavendish Beach and Green Gables. 

I started out at Green Gables as I thought this was the place that was likely to become busy later.  It was only a few miles down the road from my rotating apartment, so I arrived just after opening time and the place was virtually empty. 

I started out by walking around the mock up of the Green Gables house.  Green Gables is fictitious, but it was based on a house that really did exist and belonged to relatives of LM Montgomery.  The house was not original.  In fact, nothing from the time when LM Montgomery lived with her grandparents in the late 19^th century still exists.  The foundations and a few stones are left of the original house, everywhere else has a sign proclaiming “here stood the house/school/post office where LM Montgomery lived/studied/worked”.  You get the idea. 

What did still exist was the woodland where LM Montgomery used to walk and use her imagination to think up creations and stories for her books.  Lovers Lane and the Haunted Wood, as she named them, were still there.  I walked along Lovers Lane and through the Haunted Wood and to a post office which was not part of the National Park, but instead was owned by the family of LM Montgomery and was the site where the house where she lived with her grandparents had been located. 

I then headed into the National Park to see the coastline and beaches which was mainly what the National Park protected and especially the sand dunes as I’d seen in Greenwich a few days earlier. 

I drove all the way out to Dalvey-by-the-Sea and saw the old mansion which was now a hotel.  I went inside for a quick look, but decided not to stay to eat.  Instead I went to park up to do the Bubbling Brook hike which took me to a disappointing, dirty looking pond which was neither worthy of a photo or a walk. 

Much more rewarding was Robinsons Island and the 5km trail round the island.  This was hugely enjoyable, the trail took in the woods and the coastline.  There were 2 sets of red chairs in different locations along the trail, I set up my gorilla grip to take photos in both of them.  The trail on Robinsons Island was for both hiker and cyclists, but they had to go round the trail in opposite directions and there were several sections with adventure obstacles for mountain bikers along the route.  I didn’t meet any cyclists, I did meet some other hikers who had chosen to completely ignore the instructions about which direction they should be hiking the trail. 

After my enjoyable walk I arrived back at my car to find I’d been given a warning notice about not paying to be in the National Park.  I had paid, I’d bought a National Park Annual Pass that very morning at Green Gables, however, I’d not displayed my pass in my windscreen as I’d showed it to staff at the booth at the Park entrance and believed that was sufficient.  I spoke to rangers at the booth on the way out who said they would sort it out for me. 

I drove down to Cavendish Beach parking area and walked over the sand dunes to get to the beach.  I had seen plenty of beaches on Prince Edward Island now, so I was quite happy to drive back to the rotating house for a tour of the basement to see how it actually worked. 

The rotating house is called Around the Sea and is built on a steel disc that rotates 360 degrees one way and then back the other way.  The ground floor of the house is divided into 4 apartments which take paying guests, the upper floor is where the owner and his family live. 

As it was early in the season only 2 of the 4 apartments were occupied by tourists, me being one of them, so Steve had it rotating for a while and then stopped it with both occupied apartments facing out to sea.  He said he needed to rotate it a bit more when all the apartments were full, so everyone had a turn of a sea view, but at the moment all guests had a permanent sea view. 

Steve explained that he wanted to build a round house, but had the idea of making it a rotating house after he had seen one on a holiday in Australia.  This Australian house was made of steel.  Steve had found a company called Daltec based in North Carolina who constructed round houses that were strong enough to withstand hurricanes.  Unfortunately they told him that building a rotating house would not be possible.  Undeterred, Steve had the steel disc for the house to sit on made in Australia and shipped over.  He set the round house on top of the disc and had his rotating round house with a sea view on the northern shore of Prince Edward Island. 

The house was completed in 2012 and is the only one that has apartments to rent.  There are other rotating houses in the world, but they are privately owned and do not accept guests. 

Around the Sea is located on top of a hill, so even in fine weather it could be cold and windy and this June evening was no exception.  However, before settling in for the night, I took the shortcut path down to the shore and had an hour long walk along the beach that I could see from my rotating apartment.  The weather had acted as a good deterrent to keep everyone else off the beach tonight, so I had the place to myself. 

Tomorrow I would be leaving Prince Edward Island and exploring New Brunswick in the next part of my epic Canadian adventure.

I travelled around Atlantic Canada in June 2018.

See the Parks Canada website for more information on Prince Edward Island National Park. Fees are applicable all year round in the western section of the National Park, including Cavendish Beach and Robinsons Island. List of fees.

Green Gables Heritage Place is operated by Parks Canada and located in Cavendish and is open 9.00am to 5.00pm daily from May to October. Entrance fees apply and can be found on the website.

I stayed in one of the four ground floor apartments in Around the Sea Rotating House located in North Rustico. You can book accommodation through Around the Sea Rotating House website. There is a minimum 2 night stay in low and shoulder season and a minimum weekly stay in high season. A complimentary tour of the house to see the rotating mechanism is included.

North Rustico is located on the northern shore of Prince Edward Island in the central part of the island making it an ideal base for exploring this island province. The town is located less than 5 minutes drive from one of the entrances to the western section of Prince Edward Island National Park. North Rustico is 32km from Charlottetown, approximately 30 minutes drive and the Confederation Bridge is 52km away, approximately 45 minutes by car.

The Confederation Bridge is the only way to reach Prince Edward Island by road. It is 12.9km or 8 miles long. A fee of $47.50 per car is charged when exiting Prince Edward Island to New Brunswick. There is no charge for crossing the bridge from New Brunswick to Prince Edward Island.

Read about my other adventures on Prince Edward Island.

North Cape Coastal Drive Part 1

North Cape Coastal Drive Part 2

Points East Coastal Drive

Charlottetown – Pocket Capital of Prince Edward Island

And check out more of my posts about Canada

Canada’s Medieval Castle

Canada: Saint John River Valley

Canada: Magnetic Hill and Fundy National Park

Canada: Quebec – Waterfalls, Via Ferrata and A Religious Theme Park

I had spent a day driving around the western half of the North Cape Coastal Trail, today I was going to drive around the eastern half before heading to North Rustico to spend 2 nights on the north central coast of the island in a rotating house! 

The rotating house was at the end of the day.  The day began with a drive to Bideford.  Scott, the West Point lighthouse manager recommended I go to Bideford to see the house where LM Montgomery lived for a year when she was a teacher in 1894.  Scott had lived in the Dominican Republic and met a local called Shelly there and they had become the best of friends.  Shelly had since moved to Canada and was in charge of the museum in Bideford.  The wonderful Shelly gave me a personal tour of the house.

LM Montgomery lived in the house in 1894 and 1895 when the house was a parsonage, but originally the house had been built by a shipping merchant.  The house had passed into private hands in the 20^th century and been completely modernised.  When the house came up for sale, again it was the community wanting to save their heritage, who bought the house to prevent it being sold and transported to Cavendish to be part of an Anne of Green Gables Avonlea style experience. 

I was hugely impressed with the islanders and their commitment to preserving their local heritage.  First the community at West Point had bought the lighthouse to preserve it and now I discovered the community of Bideford had bought the old parsonage to stop it becoming a building in a kind of theme park. 

The Bideford community did have its work cut out when it purchased the property because it had been completely modernised.  The community wanted to restore the parsonage as close as possible to the original house constructed by the shipping merchant, so they had to do some extensive research using photographs and documents. 

They removed the upstairs bathroom and put it in the shed as there would have been no bathroom in the original house, but they had made one concession by putting in a toilet and wash basin in a downstairs room for museum staff.  Whilst putting the bathroom in the shed, they found some old pickles in the shed.  They had been placed on a shelf in the kitchen pantry as original.  God knows what they tasted like.  Pickling is obviously done to preserve food, but despite this process I would be surprised if the produce was still edible. 

The stairs and bannister in the house had been replaced, the craftsmen had done a really good job replicating what they had seen in photographs and even the wallpaper was as close as possible to the original pattern and colour.  They knew what the original wallpaper had been like as any new wallpaper had gone straight on top of the old wallpaper.  When they were removing the old wallpaper, it was about 10 layers thick! 

The tour took in the whole house, including the upstairs bedroom that would have been the one LM Montgomery stayed in and the rules for teachers was posted on the wall.  They were very strict; you weren’t even allowed to enjoy an ice cream! 

I was very close to Lennox Island, so I decided to make the detour there.  Lennox Island has the only First Nations population on Prince Edward Island.  It’s buzzing and there’s plenty going on in August around the time of the annual Pow Wow, in June it was extremely quiet.  There wasn’t much there, a tiny cultural centre with a few exhibits and a craft shop. 

I had expected Lennox Island to eat up a lot more of my time, as it was, it was still relatively early in the day and so I did what I’d said I wasn’t going to do and ended up driving the entire remainder of the North Cape Coastal circuit.

I was so pleased I did.  It was well worth it.  From West Point, down along the Acadian coast to Cap Egmont and on to Summerside was the most beautiful part of the Prince Edward Island coastline. 

Lots of places were still closed up before the summer season got into full swing in a week or two, but I did go to Abram Village, an Acadian community with a few craft shops open.  Ruby, my best friend in Canada, was going to become a grandmother in a few months and I’d known her daughter, Tysha, from when she was a baby.  So I wanted to find something nice to send Tysha for her new baby and the craft shop had some beautiful, soft, hand knitted baby blankets.  One in particular caught my eye, mostly white with pastel shades, but it was so soft.  It was unique, handmade and perfect for baby Willa who now uses it all the time.

I also had to visit the famous Cap Egmont Bottle House Museum.  I find all the weird and wonderful museums.  The idea for the bottle houses came from a postcard received from Vancouver Island of a glass castle and in 1980 Édouard Arsenault started collecting bottles to construct the bottle buildings at his home.  Over 25,000 recycled bottles were cemented together to create a chapel, a house with a piano in it and a tavern.  The chapel had pews made from bottles, the house had a bottle interior as well as exterior and the tavern had a bar with lots of bottles on it!  There was also a model of the Cap Egmont Lighthouse in the garden, but that wasn’t made out of bottles. 

It was a welcome attraction to break up the long drive, but even without the wonderful Bottle House Museum, that part of the coastal drive is so scenic, it would be worth doing anyway. 

I called in at Summerside, Prince Edward Island’s second city and capital of Prince County.  I had a brief walk into the city, had an ice cream and by now it was late enough for me to drive to North Rustico. 

I’d enjoyed the windy western Prince County immensely, now it was time to spend 48 hours in a rotating house by the sea!

I travelled around Atlantic Canada in June 2018.

Details of the 350km North Cape Coastal Drive including map and attractions can be found on the Prince Edward Island tourism website.

The Bideford Parsonage Museum is open daily from 9.00am to 5.00pm from June to beginning of October. Entrance costs $5.00. Bideford is located on the southerly section of the North Cape Coastal Drive 34km from Summerside and 47km from West Cape Lighthouse.

The Cap Egmont Bottle Houses attraction is open from mid May to mid October from 9.00am to 6.00pm. Entrance costs $8.00. The Bottle Houses are located at Cap Egmont on the south coast on southerly section of the North Cape Coastal Drive and 30km drive from Summerside.

Lennox Island Cultural Centre has interpretive displays about the Mi’kmaq community. Entrance is free. Guided tours are available for a fee. Lennox Island is located on the northern shore of the southerly section of the North Cape Coastal Drive, just 14km to the east of Bideford and 53km from Summerside.

Abram Village is a traditional Acadian community with craft shops and a venue for musical events which take place in high season. Abram Village is located on the southerly section of the North Cape Coastal Drive, 10km from Cap Egmont and 27km from Summerside.

Read about my other adventures on Prince Edward Island.

North Cape Coastal Drive Part 1

Points East Coastal Drive

Charlottetown – Pocket Capital of Prince Edward Island

Canada: Cavendish and the Rotating House of North Rustico

And check out more of my posts about Canada

Canada’s Medieval Castle

Canada: Saint John River Valley

Canada: Magnetic Hill and Fundy National Park

Canada: Quebec – Waterfalls, Via Ferrata and A Religious Theme Park

Today was the day to hit the 350km North Cape Trail around Prince County which covered the western third of Prince Edward Island and I had a route planned out.  I could take my time over the North Cape Trail a little more as I had 2 nights in Prince County, one at the northern end in a heritage inn and one at the southern end in a lighthouse!  This meant I could do the most westerly part of the trail on the first day and would do the other half as I journeyed back east towards Queen County, the central county of Prince Edward Island for my last 2 days.

I had stayed overnight in the Tignish Heritage Inn.  This historic building had been constructed in the 1860s as a convent school and residence.  Nuns from Montreal came to Tignish to teach in the building which opened as a school in 1868.  The nuns lived and taught in the school and some students boarded there.  The school was a private enterprise for 54 years and then became part of the public school system.  The classrooms were closed in 1966 and then the building was just a residence for the nuns.  The last of the sisters left in 1991 and 2 years later the convent was purchased by the community of Tignish and converted into an inn and meeting centre.  The fact that I stayed at the inn for the night is evidence the community achieved this objective.

I was advised to look inside the church at Tignish which was right next to the inn, so I ventured inside to look at it and was met with the sight of a bright blue ceiling covered in stars!  After this short diversion, it was time for me to venture out for the day.

For today’s itinerary, first I would go to the Wind Energy Interpretive Centre and then to the Potato Museum. 

I drove a few minutes down the road from Tignish to the North Cape Wind Energy Interpretive Centre.  There are 16 wind turbines on North Cape and it gets very windy here.  Unfortunately I got no information from the Interpretive Centre.  It was in complete darkness, the doors were locked and there was a sign on the door to say it was closed until further notice. 

I could still access the beach though, and I had managed to time it to arrive here at low tide so I could walk on the ocean floor.  The natural rock reef where the waters of the Gulf of St. Lawrence and the Northumberland Strait meet is visible at low tide, so I had a walk on the rocks that formed the ocean floor.  It was fairly early in the morning and it was windy, so I was cold!  I had my hood up on my fleece and my gloves on.  I set up my gorilla grip in order to be in some of the photos of the ocean reef and the gusts of wind kept blowing it over!  I did manage to get two or three photos with me in them to choose from before I gave up and headed back to the car.

The drive around the coast was pretty and the sand on this coast is red due to the iron deposits in the earth.  This means that the water closest to the shore has a very orange colouring on this part of the island and that’s unusual if you’re used to seeing yellow sand. 

There isn’t too much to see along the coast after the North Cape for a distance, so I made my way to the inland town of O’Leary which would probably be totally bypassed by tourists if it wasn’t home to the Canadian Potato Museum.

Potatoes are so important to Prince Edward Island that it has a whole museum dedicated to them.  30% of Canada’s potatoes are grown on Prince Edward Island, which is a staggering amount for the smallest province.  Prince Edward Island isn’t just the smallest Canadian province, it’s the smallest by a long way with an area of 5,660 square kilometres, the second smallest, Nova Scotia has an area of almost 10 times as big at 55,284 square kilometres.

You can’t pass the Canadian Potato Museum and not have a look inside, so I paid the entrance fee and looked around this unique museum, home to the Potato Hall of Fame which disappointingly featured people rather than varieties of potato which was what I had been expecting.  The Potato Hall of Fame specifically featured men who had contributed to potato cultivation on the island.  But I supposed they deserved recognition when such a tiny area of land produced almost a third of Canada’s potatoes. 

The museum was full of all that stuff you never knew you needed to know about potatoes, including all the diseases potato crops are susceptible to with handy plastic potatoes as representations of what a potato plant damaged by the disease would look like.  The Colorado beetle is the potato farmer’s worst enemy.  Britain is actually the only country to successfully eradicate the Colorado beetle, so that’s one less problem British potato farmers have to worry about. 

There was a lot of other information, such as two potatoes a day provide you with enough Vitamin C to prevent scurvy.  Captain Cook was well known for feeding his crews with Vitamin C rich foods, including potatoes, thus ensuring his sailors never died of scurvy. 

Potatoes originally come from Peru and when the Spaniards got there and raided the country for its gold, the Incas couldn’t understand why gold was so valuable to the Spanish and wondered if they ate it!  The Incas freeze dried their potatoes so they would last almost indefinitely; it was the ancient version of Smash!  When the Spanish stole their freeze dried potatoes, that’s when the Incas were really in trouble. 

More trivia, potatoes were banned in Burgundy because they were thought to cause leprosy, they were originally used as animal feed in Europe and the British didn’t eat them because the Irish cultivated and ate them, which therefore made the British consider potatoes as peasant food.  Marie Antoinette wore potato flowers in her hair.  Yes, everything you never needed to know about potatoes.

Of course, at the Potato Museum you have to also eat some potato products, including some unexpected ones.  For instance, I sampled fudge made with mashed potato which actually tasted exactly like any other fudge I’d ever eaten, I would have never guessed it had potato in it.  I had some chips in the café, but they were nowhere near as nice as the ones I’d had from the burger van in Charlottetown the day before. 

According to the information in the Potato Museum café, chips were originally French and the thin French fry was invented when someone complained about the chips being too thick and so the chef sliced the potatoes wafer thin, thus creating the French fry.

Today I was also going to visit 2 provincial parks in the far west of Prince County on the North Cape Coastal Trail. 

First I went to Jacques Cartier Provincial Park, a very small park where I parked up for 20 minutes and had a brief walk on the lovely bright orange sand beach.

After that I drove to Cedar Dunes Provincial Park which was the location of West Point Lighthouse, the first lighthouse in Canada and the tallest on Prince Edward Island.  The West Point Lighthouse was also my accommodation for the night.  I was in the Tower Room! 

After dropping off my things in my room, I put some Newman Estates wine in a portable mug and went down to the beach.  I was finally able to take advantage of some sunshine.  The sun also gave out a bit of warmth which was nice because it had been freezing all day!  In fact, Prince Edward Island had been pretty cold for most of the time I’d been here. 

I read this was the best place on the island to enjoy the sunset and my lighthouse tower bedroom window overlooked the beach and the sea.  I also read some interesting legends as I wandered along the beach and took in the information boards along the way. 

Firstly there was a legend that there was buried treasure on the beach.  There are some quite strict rules legislating treasure hunting activities if you want to avoid the wrath of the coastal gods and avoid consequences that wouldn’t be out of place as a scene in a horror film. The rules are you must dig for treasure at midnight by the light of the moon and refrain from announcing your discovery or the sand will swallow you up.  I could see a fatal flaw in these regulations.  If you have to refrain from announcing your discovery, what if someone has already dug at midnight by the light of the moon, discovered the treasure and not announced their discovery?  That would mean the treasure has gone.  But no one knows because the prospector kept it a secret to avoid the fate of being gobbled up in quicksand never to be seen again. 

The other legend is about an 80 foot sea serpent that roams the coast.  It has fur on its body rather than scales.  There were 9 sightings of this creature in 1992.  I wondered if some particularly bad strain of new hallucinogenic drug had reached Prince Edward Island that year…   

I sat back on the beach and watched the waves and sipped my wine.  I didn’t see any furry sea serpents and I wasn’t tempted to dig for treasure.  I was just enjoying a relaxing moment.  I can’t relax for long, I’m far too restless a soul for that when I’m travelling, besides which the sun was starting to sink and the temperature was falling rapidly. 

I’d been up to the top of the lighthouse earlier and now as I sat in my tower bedroom looking out of the window, I wondered if I could go to the top of the lighthouse again to watch the sunset.  The lighthouse was open as a museum for non-residents, but it was closed for the night now.  However, there was no barrier across the stairs preventing me from going up.  I decided to check if I was allowed up there, I didn’t want to set off any alarms!  The manager of the lighthouse, Scott, said that I could go up there and would I like to go outside at the top of the lighthouse?  I asked if that was possible and Scott said it was as long as he came with me. 

As we ascended the stairs Scott told me that West Point was the first lighthouse built in Canada, but when its future became uncertain, the community bought the lighthouse and turned it into a museum.  They converted a couple of rooms in the lighthouse into hotel rooms for guests and also converted some adjacent cottages into hotel rooms.  It gave the community an income that ensured they could continue to preserve the lighthouse and it offered tourists like me the experience of staying in a lighthouse.  I wouldn’t have stayed in the lighthouse if I hadn’t been able to reserve the tower room, but actually it would have been worth staying there even if the tower room hadn’t been available.  Although obviously the tower room was better! 

The door to the outside of the top of the lighthouse was an Alice in Wonderland door.  I hadn’t even spotted it when I’d been up there earlier.  It was the type of door that was too small to walk through; you had to crawl through it.  I’ve encountered quite a lot of doors like that on my travels and with all the adventurous exploits I’ve had on my trips, an Alice in Wonderland door posed no problem. 

It was beautiful outside.  The sunset was amazing.  The sky was the most gorgeous colour and there was a windfarm on this part of the coast too, so the wind turbines were silhouetted against the orange sky.  It was now very cold and getting colder, so we went back inside the lighthouse.  As Scott was on duty he had to go downstairs, but as I was safely indoors now, I could stay up here as long as I wanted.  I watched the light shining in the top of the lighthouse as a warning to passing ships.  The information about the lighthouse detailed the way the light was powered and a new system in 1823 changed its effectiveness from 17% to 83%.  Ships with their modern navigation systems didn’t really need the shining light to warn them about dangerous rocks anymore, which was why the lighthouse had been in danger of closing and falling into disrepair before it was purchased by the community.  But it was an icon of the past and I was pleased the community had chosen to preserve it.  It would be a real shame if lighthouses disappeared from the world’s coastlines.  Britain, with its long coastline and extensive seafaring history, has hundreds of lighthouses.  Being British, lighthouses are part of my heritage too.  If they weren’t I probably wouldn’t have been so enthused about overnighting in one. 

I descended the steps from the top of the lighthouse to my tower bedroom.  From a cold blustery morning on the ocean floor through potato trivia at lunchtime to an afternoon on a beach containing buried treasure and patrolled by sea monsters and culminating with watching the best sunset on Prince Edward Island from the top of the oldest lighthouse in Canada.  It had been a good day.

I travelled around Atlantic Canada in June 2018.

Details of the 350km North Cape Coastal Drive including map and attractions can be found on the Prince Edward Island tourism website.

I stayed at the Tignish Heritage Inn in Tignish. You can book and see full room details online

I stayed in the Tower Room at West Point Lighthouse in Cedar Dunes Provincial Park. You can also visit the lighthouse museum which is open to non residents from 9.00am to 8.30pm daily June to September and costs $10.

Cedar Dunes Provincial Park is free of charge to visit. It is located on the southwestern section of the North Cape Coastal Drive 24km south of O’Leary, 53 km south of Tignish and 74km west of Summerside.

Jacques Cartier Provincial Park is free of charge to visit. It is located 14km south of Tignish.

Head up to North Cape to walk on the ocean reef at low tide. The Wind Energy Interpretive Centre is open from May until October. North Cape is approximately 20 minutes drive from Tignish.

The Canadian Potato Museum is located in O’Leary. It is open from May to October and entrance fee is $10.

Read North Cape Coastal Trail Part 2

Read about my other adventures on Prince Edward Island.

Points East Coastal Drive

Canada: Cavendish and the Rotating House of North Rustico

Charlottetown – Pocket Capital of Prince Edward Island

And check out more of my posts about Canada

Canada’s Medieval Castle

Canada: Saint John River Valley

Canada: Magnetic Hill and Fundy National Park

Canada: Quebec – Waterfalls, Via Ferrata and A Religious Theme Park

On my journey from the eastern side of the island to the northwestern tip, I decided to take in Charlottetown, the provincial capital of Prince Edward Island.

As I left the eastern part of the island, I saw a couple of horse drawn coaches driving along the road.  The first one was an open trap, the other was a proper black stagecoach; it looked like the sort of thing Dick Turpin would have held up!  The people driving it were in period costume and gave me a polite wave when I slowed down as we passed so as not to frighten the horses.  I couldn’t determine whether there was some sort of event or reenactment going on or whether there was an Amish community on the island and they were part of that.  I subsequently discovered that there were Amish people on Prince Edward Island, a few had moved from Ontario to settle in a couple of communities on the eastern part of the island.

Despite Prince Edward Island being Canada’s smallest province, its capital is very important because Charlottetown was the birthplace of Canada.  The Fathers of Confederation met at Province House National Historic Site in 1864 in Charlottetown to plot out the creation of Canada.

Today was Sunday and I hoped it would be quieter and easier to park than during the week.  I parked down by the harbour and was able to leave my car there all afternoon as I explored the pocket size historic downtown area of Charlottetown.  I spent a very pleasant afternoon following the recommended walking tour route and wandering around the shops. 

There were quite a few statues around the historic district.  Opposite the cathedral were the interesting statues of two men who arrived in Charlottetown on a political conference in the 1860s.  Both of them were Conservatives, one was from Prince Edward Island and one was from New Brunswick.  And both had exactly the same name, John Hamilton Gray.  This was a very odd coincidence for the rather unusual combination of names. 

I went in the Basilica of St Dunstan, Charlottetown’s Catholic cathedral to look inside.  It was completed in 1919 after the previous cathedrals had been destroyed and is now a designated National Historic Site.  The spires are the highest points in the city and the interior is famous for its stained glass windows.

I continued my walk around Charlottetown and walked past the city’s Anglican cathedral, St Peter’s, which predates the Catholic cathedral.  This striking red stone building was founded in 1869 and is opposite the Provincial Parliament building. 

I also wandered past an impressive hotel, the Historic Rodd Hotel dating from 1931.  Originally called the Hotel Charlottetown and built by the Canadian National Railway, it was much more imposing than the understated, smaller hotels in the historic downtown area, such as the elegant Great George on a corner of Great George Street.  Still referred to as the Hotel Charlottetown, this was a typical Canadian Railway hotel, large and opulent with a white pillared entrance.  The Queen and Prince Philip stayed there in 1973 during the centennial confederation celebrations. 

Before heading up to Victoria Park, I stopped into a music shop to buy a cup of Japanese green tea.  Two Irish lads were working in the shop.  They were on Prince Edward Island as part of their studies.  They were studying Irish music in Limerick, but had come to Prince Edward Island for 6 months to study the Irish music traditions on the island and they would also be performing.  Sadly, I didn’t have time to take in any musical events in Charlottetown, so I headed up the hill towards Victoria Park.

On Kent Street next to Victoria Park is the Beaconsfield Historic House an original Victorian house built in 1877 for a wealthy shipbuilder.  It has been preserved and is now a museum, open to the public, but not on weekends in June.  It was getting quite late by now and I still had the drive to Tignish which was going to take almost 2 hours. 

I walked back down to the harbour and had a wander around the harbourside shops and then went to a burger van for my tea.  I rarely eat fast food and it’s even rarer that I buy anything from a burger van.  However, Prince Edward Island is famous for its potatoes and this was my chance to try chips made from potatoes grown on Prince Edward Island.  I don’t eat chips very often either, but the lady running the burger van had nothing pre-cooked, she cooked it all on order.  So she fried the chips in front of me when I ordered them and they were exceptionally good.  They were the best chips I tasted during my whole time in Canada.

Charlottetown is like a lot of other historic towns in North America.  The historic downtown district was similar to a lot of others I’d seen.  However, its size makes it a very manageable place to walk around and you don’t have to park miles away from the historic centre.  This pocket sized provincial capital had been a lovely way to spend an afternoon and I was pleased I hadn’t missed out on seeing the city. 

Now it really was time for me to head to the northwestern tip of the island in readiness for doing my next epic provincial coastal drive, the North Cape Coastal Drive, around the wet and windy western third of Prince Edward Island.

I travelled around Atlantic Canada in June 2018.

Details about Charlottetown and maps of the city can be found on the Prince Edward Island and Charlottetown websites

Beaconsfield Historic House is open year round Monday to Friday and at weekends in July and August.

Charlottetown is a 50 minute drive from the Confederation Bridge, a 45 minute drive from Georgetown and a 1 hour drive from Summerside.

Read more posts on my adventures in Canada.

Points East Coastal Drive on Prince Edward Island

Canada: Cavendish and the Rotating House of North Rustico

Canada: Magnetic Hill and Fundy National Park

Canada: Quebec – Waterfalls, Via Ferrata and A Religious Theme Park

Canada: Saint John River Valley

Regina – Canada’s Medieval Castle

This June was my latest trip to Canada. On this adventure, I was seeing parts of Canada I hadn’t seen before and as I’d visited Canada on numerous occasions in the past, the bits that I had left were places that most tourists who visit Canada don’t get to see. 

The day before I had driven from Halifax in Nova Scotia into New Brunswick and then across the Confederation Bridge across the water to Prince Edward Island.  It was my first visit to this Canadian province and after overnighting near Souris and sampling legally produced Canadian moonshine yesterday, today I was up bright and early to explore the eastern third of the island.

Today I was, rather ambitiously, going to drive the entire Points East Coastal Trail.  This is one of the trails the Provincial Tourism Board has put together for visitors to drive. At 475km, the Points East Coastal Trail was also the longest.

You may wonder why I decided to do this and certainly it’s an entirely fair question.  The reason was, because I had the time, at least I thought I had, and by the time I was questioning the wisdom behind my reasoning, I was determined to see it through to the end.  I was driving anticlockwise on this route and I started out at the lighthouse at the northern tip, the East Point Lighthouse, but this was closed until 10am, so I decided not to hang around for half an hour to wait for it to open and press on. 

Today was the Prince Edward Island lighthouse run and I passed a few runners on the road as I drove north.  I didn’t know there was going to be a run prior to today, had I known, it wouldn’t have made a blind bit of difference, I would not have been taking part.  I don’t run. 

In fact, instead I simply drove all the way to the Greenwich Dunes area of Prince Edward Island National Park.  The Greenwich Dunes Interpretive Centre was closed.  It wasn’t due to open until Monday.  That meant it was also free entry to the National Park, but luckily the hiking trails were open.  Some visitors from Canada’s West Coast were asking about the presence of ticks on the hiking trails.  Apparently they were currently a problem in Nova Scotia and responsible for spreading lime disease.  However, they weren’t a problem on Prince Edward Island yet. 

There were 3 trails in the Greenwich Dunes part of the National Park.  I began with the Dunes trail which was the longest, most popular and most famous.  This trail takes you on boardwalks over water to the nearby beach and you see huge parabolic sand dunes on this hike.  I had never heard of parabolic sand dunes before today, they are quite rare, so I had to look up what they were. In fact, they’re dunes gradually moving inland.  Migrating sand blows into the surrounding forest and kills the trees and then the sand dunes will move further inland and leave behind dead tree trunks to reveal a skeleton forest. 

The boardwalk started out as wood, but turned into plastic, presumably recycled plastic.  It was getting warm now, so I took off my fleece and hiked to the beach and then along the beach until I got to the sign pointing to the viewpoint.  I could just see two red chairs in the distance which was where I could sit and admire the view.  I’d read about the red chairs on the Parks Canada website.  Red chairs had been placed at various points throughout Canada’s National Parks for you to sit on and take in the view.  I wondered if they were in all the National Parks as their locations were undisclosed.  I could imagine the more popular National Parks in the Rockies, like Banff would have a queue of tourists waiting to have their photos taken there, while somewhere like Ellesmere Island National Park in the High Arctic that had very few visitors possibly wouldn’t be worth the expense of flying any red chairs out there.

These two red chairs with a view of the parabolic sand dunes had German occupants in them when I arrived, but they left a short time later, giving me the opportunity to set up my gorilla grip to capture a photo of me lounging in one of the chairs with the beach in the background.  I also took a photo of what I was looking at – the Greenwich Sand Dunes. 

After a brief rest, it was off again to hike the other trails.  The second trail wasn’t as well used as the dunes trail.  When I left the dunes trail it had started to get busy, but it seemed a lot of people didn’t bother with the other trail, which was a shame.  You got lovely views across the bay to the lighthouses at St Peter’s Harbour. 

For the sake of completeness, I did the very short trail near the car park and then went to look at Greenwich Beach.  It was much like the other beaches I’d seen, but I did climb the steps of the viewing platform to look out over the coast. Then it was time to press on if I was to manage to drive the whole Points East Trail today. 

I drove to the end of Point Prim, a narrow peninsula surrounded by the sea and home to the oldest lighthouse on the island, but the lighthouse was closed until July and this was only 9 June.  There was an artist’s workshop open though, so I called in there and bought a pair of earrings.  Earrings are a weakness on my travels, I have hundreds of pairs and some I’ve only worn once or twice, but there are others that are favourites that I end up wearing a lot. 

I did call in two wineries on my way along the southeast coastline.  The first was the Rossignol Estate Winery that produced red and white wines as well as an assortment of fruit wines and a rose liqueur.  The rose liqueur was made from rosehips and wasn’t to my taste, so I bought a bottle of the red Marechal Foch wine instead to drink in the evenings.

Then I made my way to Murray River to the Newman Winery.  This was a rather more informal affair than Rossignol as I was in the winemaker’s house and tasting wine in his kitchen!  He told me he was from New Brunswick, although his mother was an islander, and he had moved to Prince Edward Island 7 years ago to start winemaking.  He admitted to having a 9 to 5 job at present in order to live until his winemaking business became more profitable.  He had 2 varieties of white wine and 2 vintages of red.  He said the frosts could be a problem on the island, he wanted to produce chardonnay, but that could prove very challenging.  He said that late frosts had affected his red grape production this year.  He said the southeastern part of the island did have the best climate for vines that weren’t as fussy as potato crops and would grow in much worse soil.  When I commented there seemed to be nothing on the western part of the island, he said the weather there was horrible, it was just cold and windy!  Something for me to look forward to in the next few days then!

I was off again and just made it to the Cape Bear Lighthouse in time to have a very quick look round.  I climbed the tower and read some information about the lighthouse. There was a radio transmitting station next to the lighthouse at Cape Bear. This station is no longer there, but was famous for being the first place to hear the SOS signal from the Titanic in 1912. The Cape Bear Lighthouse website has a recording of this.

It was getting late now, I was getting tired, so I decided to take one last quick detour onto Panmure Island and then I was going to head back to my hotel.  I’d do the final part of the route the next day. Panmure Island is a provincial park and has one of the most popular white sand beaches on Prince Edward Island. However, as it was now well after 6 o’clock, I decided to give the beach a miss and head back to Souris to my hotel.

I was staying at the Singing Sands Inn near Basin Head Beach tonight.  Basin Head Beach was voted the best beach in Canada and is famous for its singing sands.  I enquired about the singing sands and was told it would squeak when you walked on it, so it was a bit of a leap to call it singing.  The beach is 3km long and I asked if I’d have to do a 6km round trip walk to hear the squeaking/singing?  Apparently I didn’t. 

I headed to the beach which was completely empty by this time and I was extremely disappointed not to hear sounds of singing sand as I walked along.  I suppose you could say the sand made a noise as you walked on it which you could just about hear with the competing sound of the waves.  And if you were to compare it to when you normally walk on sand and it’s virtually silent, I suppose, if you used your imagination, you could call the sound of your footsteps on the sand as a kind of squeaking.  But it was a bit of a stretch.

I even drove to the other end of the beach, accessing it from the opposite end by driving down an appalling red dirt narrow road, praying I wouldn’t meet another vehicle because there was nowhere to pass, that there would be somewhere to turn around at the end of the road so I didn’t have to reverse all the way back and that my car didn’t get stuck!  Fortunately none of these scenarios became a reality.  Unfortunately walking along this stretch of the beach I got exactly the same result with a kind of squeaking underfoot as you walked along.  It was rather disappointing.  Never mind, it had been a long day, time to head back to my hotel.

The following day I was determined to complete the entire Eastern Coastal Trail, so before driving over to the western side of Prince Edward Island I started out driving to Georgetown.

On my way there I passed through Cardigan and there, at the side of the road just after the bridge, I noticed a small building. It was the smallest library in Canada. It did try and get into the Guinness Book of World Records as the smallest library in the world, but apparently there wasn’t a category for that in the world records. I did take some photos of the library and of its interior through the window, unfortunately it was closed today as it was Sunday. This turned out to be a theme for this part of Prince Edward Island.

Soon afterwards I arrived in Georgetown. It was a beautiful community, but as it was the first half of June and also a Sunday it was still closed for winter. 

Georgetown has a gorgeous theatre and playhouse, it’s the oldest on Prince Edward Island and it doubled as the Tourist Information Centre.  Neither was yet open for the summer season, so I suffered another disappointment by not being able to get a look inside. 

Additionally just about everything else in Georgetown was closed, apart from an art gallery where everything was made on the premises by the owner, a very enthusiastic gentleman who told me that Prince Edward Island was the length of 16 Confederation Bridges.  The Confederation Bridge is just under 13km in length, so the island is around 207km long.  The artist had spent some years living on Newfoundland which was one of my destinations later on my trip.  He said Newfoundland was very big and had lots of moose that could be a real hazard on the road. 

The artist showed me all around his studio, he was very proud of his studio and it had a wonderful setting as it backed onto the beach. 

I had a walk around the lovely AA Macdonald Memorial Gardens next to the playhouse and then, as I had to get all the way over to the western side of the island and had decided to go via Charlottetown to get a look at the capital of Prince Edward Island, thought it was best to move on.  This town was unlikely to get any more lively today.  Time to see what the provincial city of Charlottetown had to offer on this June day.

I travelled around Atlantic Canada in June 2018.

Details of the Points East Coastal Trail can be found on the Prince Edward Island tourism website.

The Greenwich Dunes can be seen on trails in the eastern section of Prince Edward Island National Park. The entrance fee is applicable from mid June to mid September if you visit the Greenwich Dunes section of the National Park. However, if you wish to visit the western section of the National Park, fees are payable all year round. List of fees.

I stayed in the Singing Sands Inn in Souris. You can book accommodation through the Prince Edward Island tourism website.

Cape Bear Lighthouse is located at Murray River. It is open from 10am to 6pm and entrance fee is $5.

Newman Estate Winery is open during the summer for tastings and sales. Wine is produced from grapes grown on Prince Edward Island.

To taste legally produced moonshine and other spirits, Myriad Distillery at Rollo Bay is open in the summer for tastings and sales.

I drove from Halifax International Airport to Prince Edward Island. It is approximately 180 miles to the Confederation Bridge and a 4 hour drive. Confederation Bridge to Souris is approximately 80 miles and a 1 hour 45 minute drive.

Read about my other adventures in Canada.

Canada: North Cape Coastal Trail Part 1

Canada: North Cape Coastal Trail Part 2

Canada: Cavendish and the Rotating House of North Rustico

Charlottetown – Prince Edward Island’s Pocket Capital

Regina – Canada’s Medieval Castle

Canada: Saint John River Valley

Canada: Magnetic Hill and Fundy National Park

Canada: Quebec – Waterfalls, Via Ferrata and A Religious Theme Park

 

The city of Regina is the location of a surprising building, Stone Hall Castle which is Canada’s only medieval castle.

Tonight I had a date with the owner of Stone Hall Castle, former professional ice hockey player, Jason Hall who now called this place home. What, you don’t believe that I had a date with a handsome, rich, professional athlete who lives in his own castle?

Obviously, of course I didn’t! Well it wasn’t a date in the conventional sense of the word. Or indeed, in any sense of the word at all. It was actually a personal guided tour. So I’ll now give you an accurate account of my evening and leave any fictional embellishments firmly in my imagination where they belong!

I’d found Stone Hall Castle online. You could take a guided tour of the castle in the afternoon or the evening.  You could also stay at the castle overnight.  But although you could stay at the castle, this wasn’t a hotel in the conventional sense of the word either. The owner lives in Stone Hall Castle and there are only a couple of rooms available to stay in. At around £900 per night, it was well out of my price range and apparently the price range of most other people too, as Jason said he didn’t have a lot of people staying, that wasn’t his main source of income.

If I had lots of money I would have treated myself to a couple of nights there, it was in a great location in the city centre, right by the Royal Saskatchewan Museum. And who hasn’t dreamt about sleeping in a medieval castle? As it was, I settled for a bed and breakfast round the corner and a tour of Stone Hall Castle instead.

I did think that Stone Hall Castle was a traditional hotel as I’d found the rooms available on the internet and as I walked up to it, I expected the door to be open and there to be a reception.  However, on arrival the front door was locked.

From the outside, Stone Hall Castle doesn’t look like a medieval castle, for a very good reason.  It wasn’t built during medieval times.  It’s in Canada, no one was building castles in Canada in the Middle Ages.  It’s only once you get inside that the magic begins.

I’d booked my tour for the evening online, which was the only way available for me to book, as it wasn’t a hotel with a reception I could walk into which would have enabled me to make enquiries.

I stood on the steps by the door of the castle waiting.  No one else was around.  I’d only booked my tour that afternoon, I was concerned that the booking hadn’t gone through and that there was no tour tonight after all.  However, at exactly 7 o’clock the front door opened and the owner of Stone Hall Castle opened the door.

Once you step into the hallway of the castle, you are transported into a medieval world.  Forget about the world outside, once that door closes you could be in a castle in England in the 15th century. This certainly does look like a medieval castle.

Jason told me I was the only person who had booked the tour that evening and so I was getting a personal guided tour, which was rare, it was apparently only about the third one he had done. He explained that he’d been a professional ice hockey player in the German leagues from the late 1980s for about a decade, had then returned to Canada, invested in real estate and finally bought Stone Hall Castle when it came up for sale and turned it into Canada’s only medieval castle.  He had genuine European antique furniture and paintings that he’d purchased at auctions and the result was an interior that was a cohesive replica of a medieval dwelling fit for nobility, even down to the wax candles that lit the rooms with wax dripping all over the floors.  It did also have a few things that medieval English kings wouldn’t have had the benefit of, such as electricity and modern plumbing, which meant it was possible to have a wide screen television and a spa bath!

The history of the castle was an interesting one. It was constructed in 1926 and the story reminded me of the reason for the construction of Scotty’s Castle in Death Valley, all because of a woman. Our demand for high standards meant Scotty’s Castle was constructed so Albert Johnson’s wife wouldn’t have to sleep in a tent in the desert.

The story Jason told me behind the construction of Stone Hall Castle was similar. Francis Darke’s wife was terrified of being killed in a tornado, so her husband built her a house that was strong enough to withstand the high winds and rains that could tear through the city, destroying its more flimsy buildings.   Limestone was used to construct Stone Hall Castle and Annie Darke lived there in safety for almost 40 years until her death in the 1960s.

Following the death of Annie Darke, the castle was bought by a family who ran it as a funeral home. I know castles are supposed to be haunted, but perhaps that is taking things a little bit too far! For a long time no one thought about Stone Hall Castle as being a castle at all, it was simply a chapel of rest and funeral director’s premises in the city of Regina.

The building was purchased by Jason in 2003 and he decided to renovate the interior and turn it into a medieval castle inside. He’d spent time in Bavaria an area particularly rich in castles and palaces, I wrote about some of them in my posts on the fairytale castles of King Ludwig II of Bavaria.

Jason said he did live in the castle so video wasn’t permitted, but I could take photos which was good. It was actually much better than I expected. But I’ll get to that later. He also said I wasn’t allowed to open drawers and wardrobes because it was his home. I presumed it had happened in the past which was the reason for implementing this rule, but it would never have occurred to me to do that anyway. Sometimes I wonder about people…

We started the tour on the ground floor.  Jason certainly likes his wax candles.  In the first room, there was a candelabra on the with wax dripping all over the floor. Jason said he was the one who cleaned up the wax, not a job I’d have liked very much. It must have been quite a task too, there were candelabras in most rooms.  This first room was a reception room with a dining table, the table and chairs were antiques, above there was a balcony and the chandeliers hanging from the ceiling were a typical style, like you would have had at a medieval banquet.

The library came next and the first thing I noticed, and that Jason also pointed out, was that there were no books in the library. He said he wanted to buy some antique books, but they were both ludicrously expensive and very rare, making it virtually impossible to fill a library, even a fairly modest sized one like this. In England I’m used to seeing old books in stately homes that have been in the family for centuries.  However, the families don’t tend to auction their books and few old books would have existed in Canada, so they wouldn’t be easy to come by.  I don’t know whether Jason will decide to leave the library without books or purchase some replicas, but it seems unlikely he’ll be able to stock Stone Hall Castle’s library in the same way as somewhere like Chatsworth House.

Nevertheless, I was enjoying my tour of the castle so far, I thought the bear skin rug was a nice twist, it was something that could have graced the floor of a medieval castle in England, but it was also a very Canadian animal, I’d had a close encounter with a black bear in Manitoba just two days before. Thankfully the bear was too interested in his Saskatoon berries to bother about me! Jason admitted he was quite scared of bears, as I recounted my adventure in Riding Mountain to him.

We then went into the cinema room and I settled on a comfortable sofa to watch a video about renting Stone Hall Castle for a special occasion or staying the night. It was something I would have loved to have done, but it was so expensive, unless I acquire a lot more money than I’ve got now, it wasn’t about to become a reality any time soon.  The tours were the main business at Stone Hall Castle, events and overnight stays were more occasional. Something to bear in mind if I ever win the Euro Millions…

After watching the video the tour continued upstairs and this was where I got to see the bedroom suites.

The bedrooms were fitted out with antique furniture, including 16th century wooden framed beds from Europe that had been acquired at auction. The beds were covered with animal hides. I absolutely loved the bedroom suites.

In the first bedroom suite I asked Jason if he’d take a photo of me by the bed, assuring him I’d be careful not to touch it.  Jason said I could lay on the bed if I wanted to. I was surprised. When you go in medieval castles and stately homes in England you can’t touch anything. Furniture is roped off and alarmed, it is strictly look but don’t touch.  So being able to sit on this bed was completely alien to me.

The bathrooms have copper baths installed in them and Jason suggested I get into the bath for a photo. This was a first for me, clambering into a copper bath in a medieval suite to have my photo taken. It was something that I was never going to get the opportunity to do again, so I climbed in!

The second bedroom had another antique, wooden framed bed also covered with animal skins. I laid back in a relaxing pose on that bed too for more photos and being able to do that really set this tour apart.  As I’ve said, being English, I’m so used to not being able to get close enough to an antique bed in an English castle for a decent photo, never mind being able to lay on it, that the opportunity to get great photos like this was a real treat.

There were plenty of paintings in the castle and these were all old paintings bought from European collections, dating back several hundred years.  The fireplaces looked authentic. I was really enjoying looking around.

Stone Hall Castle also has a throne room with wooden thrones and again, I was permitted to sit on one of the antique thrones, like I was a queen, for more photos. I also sat at a desk in the room where as a queen I would have signed the death warrants! Probably the only thing I’d be interested in signing as a queen. I’d be like the madcap Queen Elizabeth I in Blackadder!

I have an interest in English history and enjoy watching historical documentaries, so Jason and I chatted at some length about the history of English monarchs. Obviously I learnt a lot of English history at school, and coupled with the reading I’ve done and the historical properties I’ve visited in England in my lifetime, I have a fairly extensive knowledge base, so it made for a really interesting conversation.

We ended by going to the top floor of the castle, to the Master Suite with another medieval wooden bed with animal furs covering it and a hot tub in the bathroom. I didn’t lay on this particular bed as this was the room Jason was using as his bedroom. I thought it would be inappropriate to lay on this bed for a photo, so I didn’t even ask.

The décor in Stone Hall Castle, the antique furniture, the candelabras with their candles dripping wax on the floor, the animal hides on the beds, copper baths, bear skin rugs, old portraits, suits of armour, everything in here makes you believe you are in a medieval castle and for an hour and a half you really can leave the outside world behind and indulge in the fantasy that you’re living as a noble in 15th century England.  The fact that you can sit on the furniture rather than having to look at everything from behind ropes makes it a much more realistic experience, you’re completely transported into the past, you can genuinely believe in the fantasy, even if only for a short time.

Isn’t it every girl’s dream to live as a queen in a castle? Well for a while, on that Wednesday evening in Regina, I was living that dream.

My ultimate fantasy would be to wear a beautiful long dress, fit for a queen and spend a couple of nights at Stone Hall Castle. I think that fiction will also have to remain firmly in my imagination.

I would thoroughly recommend a tour of Stone Hall Castle. Seeing inside Canada’s only medieval castle is a unique experience.  Jason is, quite rightly, very proud of what he’s done to Stone Hall Castle since he bought it and that’s easy to see in his enthusiastic tour presentation. It was a brilliant way for me to spend my last night in Canada. I can’t promise you’ll get a personal tour like I did, but you will have a fabulous time.

I travelled to Saskatchewan in mid July 2018.

Stone Hall Castle is located in Regina.  Tours cost $30 CAD per adult. More details about Canada’s only medieval castle can be found on the Stone Hall Castle website.

I stayed at Dragon’s Nest Bed and Breakfast which is a 10 minute walk from Stone Hall Castle and the Royal Saskatchewan Museum.

 

To read about more of the castles I’ve visited throughout the world, check out these posts.

Kronborg Castle in Denmark.
Helsingør – Hamlet’s Castle

King Ludwig II’s fantasy castles and palaces and related palaces in Bavaria.
Neuschwanstein Castle
Linderhof Palace
Palace of Herrenchiemsee
Schloss Nymphenburg and the Munich Residenz

 

Read more about my trip to Canada in the below posts

Canada: Points East Coastal Drive on Prince Edward Island

Canada: North Cape Coastal Trail Part 1

Canada: North Cape Coastal Trail Part 2

Canada: Charlottetown – Pocket Capital of Prince Edward Island

Canada: Cavendish and the Rotating House of North Rustico

Canada: Quebec – Waterfalls, Via Ferrata and A Religious Theme Park

Canada: Magnetic Hill and Fundy National Park

Canada: Saint John River Valley