TrikingPals: We Made It to Prince Edward Island!

We made it to Prince Edward Island! This was one of our goals for this trip, and we did it. We arrived Saturday afternoon to the KOA at Borden, which is right off the bridge onto the island. But before we tell you about PEI, we should tell you about our two Harvest Host nights beforehand.

Thursday night we stayed at the Vignoble Domaine L’Ange Gardien winery outside Quebec City, where we could see the St. Laurence River. After traveling 260 miles, we had a lovely wine tasting, and were able to walk the vineyard and apple orchard.

I loved this tree that stood beside their wine tasting porch. Its flowers changed from white to pink the further each branch extended.

Then we said good bye to Quebec and traveled 350 miles into New Brunswick on Friday. We stayed at the Big Axe Brewery in Nackawic. We were one of ten RVs that arrived for the night. Thankfully their parking lot was so large we had no issues with space or quiet. Our parking area overlooked the St. John River, which is quite wide at that point. In the morning it had wisps of fog rising from it. We enjoyed their beer also, but their internet was down so we were restricted to the Canadian cash we had. (Slowed down our drinking which was probably a good thing.)

We left early on Saturday for the 230 mile drive onto Prince Edward Island. We got setup in our site, which was none too level, and discovered that our slideout on the trailer is totally broken. We’re now evaluating when and how to get it worked on. Darn! Canada and the US have some pretty rough roads. Even going slowly, the trailer gets knocked around.

To drown our woes, we decided to go out for dinner. Lobster had to be on the menu. How did we do?

Since we can live in the trailer with the slide not deployed, we figured Sunday would be a great triking day. We went from Borden-Carleton to Kensington on the Confederation Trail. This trail’s total length is 449 km or 279 miles. Round trip we logged about 45 miles. We were plenty tired and hungry when we returned. We used all four batteries on the ride, because the surface is crushed stone. Here are a few photos:

Yesterday we triked from Royalty Junction to Mt. Stewart, a total of 35 miles but with a nasty headwind all the way back. You’d think that wouldn’t be too much of a problem for recumbents, but it was so forceful and persistent, it tired us out. You should have seen the upright (upwrong?) cyclists struggling with it!

This area had several bogs. We learned that quaking aspens are one of the first species to take hold after logging or fire as they can tolerate a wide variety of adverse conditions including boggy peat soil. So, when aspens are logged from an area like this, they must be trucked away, as they don’t float on water — too much water in them. The other tree found in the bog is the tamarack, a deciduous conifer. This unusual tree thrives in marshy ground in symbiosis with certain fungi around their root system that help them replenish the nutrients lost when they shed their needles.