Moving to Prince Edward Island (06-25-13)

Moving from St. John to PEI  wasn’t going to be an all day affair, so we stopped in Moncton along the way.  Moncton is one of the best places to witness the tidal bore. The Bay of Fundy has the highest tides in the world, and in certain areas (rivers), when the tide comes in, it arrives in the form of a wave, called a bore.   

So many people come to see this phenomenon that they built a viewing park and someone came to give a little explanation as to what the bore is.  We missed by one day the tallest bore of the year, but it was still cool.  When the moon and sun line up perfectly, the pull makes a higher tide and a taller bore.  The tide in nearby Hopewell Rocks was 44.3 feet.

This is the bore as it passed us:

It was actually really awesome to see. Once the bore arrives, the river rises about 26 feet in an hour. That was cool to watch too. For a while. Then we left. I took two videos of the bore as well, but the campground Wi-Fi blocks certain websites at peak use times and YouTube is one of them. If I stay up late enough to try again later, you’ll see the two videos here:

                                          

Once we left Moncton, it was a short trip to the bridge over to PEI.  Paul and I both smiled at this sign that we saw along the way.  They sure do grow their moose big up here!

Once we were over the bridge, it quickly became clear how beautiful the island is. 

In many ways it feels like going back in time a bit.  Much of the land is farmland, and Lupin grows wild along all the roads, and picturesque harbors seem to be around every corner.

We took the day and drove around parts of the island, because frankly, it was cold, windy, and spitting rain every once in a while, so we didn’t feel like doing anything else.

We did brave the coast to go check out PEI National Park, and bought an annual pass so we can spend as much time as we want in the Canadian National Parks. The red sandstone here makes for a dramatic look along the coast.

We had to make it back early enough to have dinner and head out to a show.  The town we are staying in, Summerside, is home to the College of Piping and Celtic Performing Arts.

They put on a show all summer long, called Highland Storm, which technically opens for the season tomorrow night.  Lucky for us, we found out they do a dress rehearsal the night before they open, and we were able to get tickets to that.

We both thoroughly enjoyed the show, which was a combination of bagpipes, drums, dancing, and singing, with a little comedy thrown in too. Very entertaining, and some of the performers were quite talented. Many of them compete on a national or international level.




Tomorrow we head to a provincial park for about 5 days and I know it has no Wi-Fi, so I wanted to get this posted before we leave. That was more frustrating than usual, since the campground system wouldn't let me even upload my blog using my usual software, Live Writer, so I had to do it the old fashioned way.