Anne's Land

15 June 2015

Anne’s Land (Cavendish)

Our campground was literally next door to Green Gables, our fist stop of the day.  The weather warmed up when we got there, so I changed the girls into more field-frolicking-friendly attire, for photos, obvs.  It was still a slight bit chilly, but I would have regretted not doing it.  When in Rome…

The house and grounds were very picturesque and not too crowded at all.  There were also two trails on the premises, Lover’s Lane and the Haunted Woods, but ghosts were not the problem today – the mosquitoes were unbearable.  Initially we’d hoped it was a campground issue, but even Green Gables was overtaken with them, to the point where we passed on some of the trails.  Our kid-friendly eco-friendly organic bug spray wasn’t handling them well at all.  We decided to leave and go somewhere else, which turned out to be a food mart for some DEET kid-friendly bug spray, (which we never ended up using), and then Avonlea Village. 

Avonlea Village is a small, fabricated old-tymey town with restaurants and stores, and the church that Lucy Maud Montgomery (author of Anne of Green Gables) grew up worshipping at (moved from its original location).  In the real summer they also have games and shows, including Anne of Green Gables: The Musical.  Today, all but two restaurants were still under construction, as were some of the stores.  We grabbed some lunch at the Baked Potato, a little place that dresses potatoes up in a number of different ways – mine with Butter Chicken, Matt’s with spicy pork, the girls’ with a meaty poutine.  (Fun fact: PEI supplies 25% of Canadian potatoes).

Anne of Green Gables is so celebrated here, that Canada even distinguished parts of the area as National Park lands.  We spent the afternoon at the beach part of the National Park in Cavendish.  The girls played in the sand for a bit, stacking some of the red clay rocks that are pretty evenly spread across the beach.  After that we went for a long walk on the beach, (even longer for 3-year-old-legs), while Eloise took a snoozey on my back.  We cut in between two dunes to find a little trail among the tall grass to a saltwater lake that fills and empties with the changing tides.  The water on our feet was warmer than expected, and apparently the waters in the Gulf of St. Lawrence are some of the warmest north of the Carolinas, due to how shallow the water is.  After crossing the tide stream back to the shoreline, we found several silvery fish flopping around, and Dada picked one up to show Sis and see if she wanted to touch it, but she didn’t.  (She pet one a fisherman caught in “Anbucket” last summer). 

Today was especially great, because for the first time this entire trip, I don’t think we even put five miles on the odometer.  Or however many kilometers that is.  After the beach, we took the girls to Grandpa’s Old Tyme Photos, where we spent way too much money on one hard copy (and no digital copies) photo of the girl people dressed like the timeframe of Anne of Green Gables.

We once again got ready for the pool and trekked over, only to find the water was frigid, so we took the girls to the giant trampoline bubble playground thing instead, which was already overcapacity in gnats.  They loved it though.  We ordered some pizzas for dinner, and toyed with the idea of catching a sunset west of Cavendish, but a 3-year-old mega-meltdown and a 1-year-old sleepy girl changed those plans.

Baby Gear Used Today:

Green Gables and Avonlea:  The City Mini GT Double.  It handled the trails (the parts we braved the mosquitoes for) greatly, and navigated the shops and restaurants of Avonlea village just as well.  I even fit a generic stroller mosquito net over the entire thing after leaving Green Gables.

The Beach:  ErgoBaby Sport.  Eloise slept on my back for our walk on the beach (she gets so excited when I put her in the “mommy ride.”  I was able to keep her face out of the sun by using the snapping sunshade too.