20C this morning and pouring rain. The decision to stay the extra day pays off, because we had planned to leave this morning to drive 5 hours to a Provincial Park on the other side of the Northumberland Straight for a day at the beach. The drawback? No sewer on site. The weather is the same over there so we missed absolutely nothing. And we saved 3 hours of breaking down and setting up, and 5 hours (at least) of driving.
We hung around the trailer until noon. We took our time getting ready because we have no agenda today and the weather sucks. The kids spent the morning playing the puzzle games and puzzles from the Toy Factory.
We decided to try to ejumacate the kids today. We took them to visit Founders hall – a building dedicated to Confederation. We drove to Charlottetown and found the museum right away. We knew the little ones would be bored, but they were all very well behaved and Guylaine and I had a chance to see everything in the museum. One really good thing was that the museum offered headphones and when you entered an area you would get a verbal description, often accompanied by a video. The whole thing was done in a timeline. It saved having to read everything and gave a very good flow to the museum. We really enjoyed it. It had stopped raining by the time we got out of the museum, so we drove around Charlottetown a bit to see what we could find. We did manage to find an oil change place. The caddy was overdue, and with the long haul for the next 2 days to get home, I really wanted to get it done. Unfortunately, there is NO place in PEI where you just drive in and stay in the car, so we had to get out and entertain the kids (with a bribe from McDonalds as well as a game of tag with mom) while they were working on the truck.
We had passed a Lou Lou shop on the way and wanted to see if there were any deals (like we can afford Lou Lou). Turns out, it’s not Lou Lou Lemon, it’s Lou Lou’s second hand shop. Guylaine didn’t buy anything.
We had heard of a good beach down this way, but low tide was only at 8:00, so we followed a scenic route that brought us down highway 19. We saw a sign for a lighthouse, so we went to check it out. The lighthouses here are automated, so the buildings are locked and designed to keep trespassers out, but this one looked like the haunted mansion we visited a couple days ago. To make matters worse, there was a car there with no one in it. There is nothing around here, no hiking trails, nothing but the lighthouse and cliffs, so it seemed strange to see a car but no people. We took turns looking into the window of the lighthouse and I saw an opportunity to freak the kids out a bit, so I pretended like I saw a shadow inside. The doors were closed off with metal, and an old style cellar from the outside was padlock, so we told the kids that the metal door and locks on the outside were obviously to keep whatever was in there in. We couldn’t explain the abandoned car, but Guylaine and I openly discussed possible theories of a family being dragged into the woods by a psychopath. Alex suggested that we go back to the trailer and tell ghost stories tonight, but even as I write the blog at 11:30, he’s already been out once to tell us he’s scared. Personally, I thought the haunted mansion would have had them more frightened then this.
We kept driving until we came to the beach we were looking at. The big attraction here was that at low tide, we were told the kids could find star fish, and sure enough, mixed in with the hoards of fighting hermit crabs, really big fiddler crabs, barnacles and seaweed, there were star fish. The sand on the beach was nice, but the beach itself seemed a little gross to Guylaine and I. Regardless, the weather wasn’t nice enough to permit a swim anyways. We stayed for a bit then hit the road again.
We were almost all the way to Confederation Bridge, so we thought we’d make a quick stop at the gift shops, as there were things we wanted yesterday and didn’t buy. But even though they were they same shops as the boardwalk, they didn’t have the same stuff. The girl at the shop told us the boardwalk was open until 11:00, so we flew down there and finished our shopping. Everyone got something. The only thing I’ve bought myself on this trip was a hat, and Alex has already inherited it. (Not the Anne of Green Gables hat) Guylaine said I bought myself some oil for the caddy.
We got back to the campsite at 10:00! Talk about making the most of our last day. We gave the kids a quick snack before bed, and a quick shower. Guylaine started packing. That’s it. Two days of driving home and the summer is officially over. Well, the part worth blogging over anyways.
No comments:
Post a Comment