Island LIfe on Prince Edward...

One of several photogenic PEI Lights, this one on Panmure Island.

We can only wonder what Prince Edward Island was like 20 years ago before the Confederation Bridge was opened, and the only access for vehicles was by ferry. There are many smallish islands which thrive despite their isolation (e.g. Tasmania), but nevertheless, suddenly connecting an island with a bridge must have a significant effect.

PEI's major town is Charlottetown. This town was the site of the conference in 1864 held between provinces of Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, Canada (Quebec + New Brunswick) which ultimately led to the formation of the confederation of Canada as a new nation. Newfoundland should have been there, but were late, and a circus in town apparently filled the hotels and required many conference delegates to stay on ships in the harbour. Even then, politics were trumped by entertainment in the public's eye!

Home of the PEI Provincial Government. Maybe the Confederation Convention was held here?

The road into Charlottetown from the bridge was, like most others we encountered in New Brunswick, of excellent quality. It makes you wonder why Australian roads cannot be so good in remote regions.

Colourful housing in downtown Charlottetown.

Charlottetown is a flat harbourside city (in fact, PEI is a pretty flat island), and we stayed in a very well located downtown hotel in Grafton Street. Just as in New Brunswick, we found that the Information Centre (marked with a '?'), despite being promoted as 'open year round' was firmly closed 'for the season' when we arrived at the front door. The locals seem to speak with an accent quite unusual to us, and with certain mannerisms. Maybe we are hearing anglisised version of Acadaian which is a particular dialect of French spoken in this part of the world, maybe not!

This skating pond in Charlottetown is starting to melt in unusually warm weather.

At Beanz, maybe the best coffee we have found so far on this trip. The friendly barista went to great pains to follow our recipes, then delivered it to our table in real cups with real spoons!

Throughout Maine and New Brunswick, the terrain we passed was pretty heavily snowed in, but coverage on PEI was pretty sparse. The land is generally pastoral, with mostly potatoes grown (in rich red soil), but we could always see the cultivation tracks through the thin snow cover.

The Point Prim Light is the oldest on PEI, seen here under very leaden skies.

Summer visitors to PEI flock to Cavendish on the northern shore to see where Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Montgomery was set. Expecting nothing to be open there, we took advice and chose to follow PEI's very pretty coastline. The island is not so big, and we hoped to drive the eastern loop road (identified by starfish signs), but in a full driving day, only got about a third of it done. We obviously dawdle too much, and the truth is, we take it easy, start late and finish early.

This chowder bar at Point Prim won't serve another clam or mussel until next summer.

In our part loop, we managed to see much beautiful ice/snow-covered shoreline and several lighthouses. We couldn't get to the twin lights at Beach Point because the of last stretch road was pure sheet ice, no attempt to clear it. Wood Islands was particularly pretty - it is a tiny harbour which receives a car ferry in summer, but was totally empty and abandoned for our visit.

Numerous lights guard the entrance to the Wood Islands ferry harbour, closed for winter.

During our stay on PEI, we did not see a single other person who could be identified as a tourist or a visitor. But plenty of people live here (~140,000), and so Charottetown had pleny of establishments open for us to dine and imbibe. Our hotel was pretty quite, maybe 10% full, the other guests being businessmen and tradies. Having feasted on lobster in Maine, we though we could do the same on PEI, but with the harbours frozen and the boats out of the water, the local industry is in recess and lobster is not available.. In the Irish Pub, The Olde Triangle, the waitress explained that lobster is off the menu because it would have to be 'imported'. This may be a strategy to harvest lobsters sustainably, because there seemed to be no difficulty or objection to importing almost all other food and seafood.

The Fowler family has gone to some trouble to decorate their front lawn near Point Prim.

Ice fishing tents on Murray Harbor, PEI. Empty, we suppose, because no pick-up was parked out there.

Like we found in Maine, you would have to spend a lot more time on PEI to explore it properly, but our ultimate objective is Nova Scotia, and we must move on!

Some places the waters of Northumberland Strait are fully iced, other not.