PEI (Prince Edward Island) Canada

 Prince Edward Island!!!!  We started our journey onto the island with a car passing us and pointing to the trailer.  They actually pulled in front of us with the hazard lights on and slowed down in front of us to slow us down.  I thought "Oh crap one of the bikes fell off" but one of the locking doors on the side had opened and was flapping in the breeze.  We thanked the people who were also RV'rs and started back on our way.  We arrived at the campground around 2:00pm to a very strong wind blowing in off the water.  When I say strong, I mean 40mph and enough to rock the camper while its sitting on the stabilizers.  After setting up camp we headed to Charlotte town to see what was going on and to our surprise Prince William and Kate we coming in for a visit! I decided that I was going to snap a picture as it would make for good blog material!  So we waited about an hour and then they arrived so I reached up over the crowd and snapped a few pics with my phone and wallah, a pretty good shot of them!  The next morning it was gloomy and still a little on the windy side so we went to see more of the area attractions and see a lighthouse  One thing I can say for Canada is they are not as strict about a lot of things as the USA.  You can see by the pics of us on the cliffs next to the lighthouse and also the picture of us by the GIANT wind turbines.  We drove right to the base of these turbines and the kids and I got out to here the awesome sound of these giant blades cutting through the air.  In the morning the wind had calmed and we were off to the famous Anne of Green Gables village.  At first I wasn't feeling the whole thing but once inside the environment was fun and full of things for the kids to see and do.  The built sand castles with Maurice Bernard a local artist.  They had potato sack races,stilts,carriage rides a petting zoo and the whole time they reenacted scenes from the movie through out the day. Kaylee even got her hair braided by the character Anne herself!  My favorite was the music which was a Maritime/Acadian style wrapped up with a Nova Scotian twist!  It was such a good show I went back 2 hours later to catch the second!  In between the music I got to talking with an original Acadian gentleman with the muttonchops and everything!  He told me his version of the Acadian history and how they were deported by the British and only a handful of families managed to stay in the area as the rest were sent back to France or fled to other countries.  He went on to say they fled to Louisiana before the we purchased it from France and some went to the Canadian Rockies.  Needless to say he wasn't excited about the visit from Prince William and Kate!  After leaving the village we headed for a must see attraction of a PEI which was a sand dune that was constantly moving and swallowing up the forest.  So we drove and drove and drove to the park of this sand dune.  By this time the sun was starting to go down but we still had spring in our step and started down the path to the dunes.  The mosquitos had a different plan!  They were thick and we had flashbacks of the mosquito mugging down in assateague state park.  While walking to the dunes we crossed paths with a few people heading out and they said the dunes are about 2 kilometeres down the path so on we went through the woods and over a specatular floating boardwalk to the dunes.  Evidently sand is not that easy to come by in PEI as it looked like a normal sand dune to us. We were like thats it? Oh well suns really getting low in the sky and the mosquitos were sharpening there fangs. We turned the kids around and headed back through our roughly 1-mile walk back and the mosquitos were waiting for us! Now I know knowbody dies from being attacked by mosquitos but deep down you start to think man how many bites can I take!  We litterally stated jogging with the kids to keep them off from us and all the while Bryson is stopping asking questions about this that and the other.  My job was to keep him moving  and keep the mosquitos off of him.  Then of course "daddy I have to go to the bathroom" in the middle of it all. Bryson litterally came out of the portolet with hundreds of mosquitos in tow and his pants and underware down around his ankles!  Luckly we made it back to the truck without losing anyone!  The next day we were up and at it headed to Cape Breton Nova Scotia to see the Cabot trail!

Good Bye BarHarbor! Sadly we must move on!

Bryson found the mud holes!

Well sadly, we have to say good bye to Bar Harbor!  I put it on the list of places that are definitely a can't miss to anyone traveling this way!  As we were driving out of town, the smell of the local lobster pounds were in the air!  You see they use a wood fire to heat 55 gallon drums of salt water for cooking the lobsters. These pounds are scattered up and down the main highway leading into Acadia National Park right on the sides of the road.  We pushed back our departure date several times due to the beautiful scenery and quaint little towns full of jellies, jams, ice cream, fresh lobsters and the list goes on and on.  Time is ticking and we must get on our way!

Bay of Fundy is the next stop on our trip.  We pulled into our campground late in the evening around 7:30, so we setup and called it an early night.  The next morning, we traveled to the Hopewell Rocks about 2 km down the road!  The whole Kilometer thing takes some time getting used.  We walked down to the rocks which they call Flower Pots, because the trees grow out of the top of the rocks that are surrounded by water during high tide.  Once getting down on the sea floor we had a great time walking through the caves and looking at the beautiful scenery.  The kids had fun playing around chasing each other and trying to see how much mud Bryon would get into.  Well Bryson got pretty dirty, so we had him rinse off in the bay with Norman who was just as bad! "My poor truck" is all I can say about that. We noticed the water seemed to be moving back into the bay, so we decided to build a little marker out of stacked rocks and see how fast the tide was rising.  It took less than 30 seconds for the water to cover 6" of rocks and just to make sure we weren't seeing things we did it again making sure the rocks were not in the water to start with. Once again the tide swallowed up the rocks right before our eyes! From here we went up and cleaned off in the designated wash area. You see, the Bay of Fundy has a lot of clay on the bay floor.  So much that the water is stained red and there are even local artists who make pottery from this stuff.  It reminds me of good ol' Georgia red clay! After cleaning up, we headed out for some more exploring of the coast.  We found a scenic Bay of Fundy drive that runs along part of the coast. On this drive, we stumbled across a place called Cape Enrage which had a nice beach, so we decided to stay for awhile.  There is no sand just smoothly polished rocks that lead right down into the water.  We let the kids skip rocks and Norman even did some swimming in the cool water.

Friends Like Family!

In this world you have casual friends, you have close friends and then you have friends that are like extended family!  We were fortunate enough to spend some time with some of the latter. Heidi & Jonathan, Ariana, Abby, the Burrows family and Nancy (My God mother and Heidi's mom) & Bob! We drove from Bar Harbor to Skowhegan Maine to meet with these friends that I have known since I was a baby.  Although separated for more than 30 years due to life's changes we seemed to pickup right where we left off. 

We met at a great little sandwich joint named Mr. G's deli!  After ordering and eating some sandwiches bigger than a pie plate, we headed to Heidi and Jonathan's house! On the way we stopped to pickup food for dinner!  We picked up Steaks, fresh corn on the cob and crazy little purple potatoes.  Heidi would not let me pay for any of the food.  I tried several times to give her money.  On to the house we went. 

After arriving at the house the kids hit it off immediately and began playing.  Heidi and Jonathan gave us a tour of the house and explained how they built the house themselves.  When I say built it themselves I mean with their own two hands - not subbing it out, like most people do when they say they built it themselves.  I was completely blown away that they took on such a project.  They even built their own well!

They had an outhouse that they used until the plumbing was installed and they just recently had the electricity run from the street!  Jonathan made the newel posts and handrails leading upstairs out of birch trees cut from their back yard.  The house had so much character and personality.  Karen and I were so impressed with their achievements we discussed the house in awe for the 2 hour ride home.  I now understand how people build a house and then stay there for the rest of their lives.  Jonathan went on to tell me that they are going to go solar in the future and get off the grid in hopes of someday being total self sufficient.

Prior to dinner Bob and I snuck off to a local stream to try our luck at fishing.  I caught a small mouth Bass and he caught a small trout.  Then the rain came, so we headed back to the house.  Dinner was delicious and after it was time for Nancy's famous campfire pie irons!  We loaded them with cherry, apple, or peach filling and grilled them over the campfire! We had such a good time visiting that we didn't want the day to end, but we had a 2 hour drive back to Bar Harbor.  We had to say goodbye. Nancy, Bob, Heidi & Jonathan - Thank you for for a great day and being such good friends!