PEI For Canada Day

**click the picture to see many, many more pictures**

Greg and I took the ferry across to PEI last weekend to take in the Canada Day festivities and visit friends!

Before we got on the ferry we checked out the terminal which included lobster traps! There were also arcade games (which we played) and a portable library crate where people are invited just to take the books with them - forever! Greg was pretty happy about it:

The ferry ride to PEI was lovely, we both enjoyed coffee and read (and I didn't even get motion sick!). At one end of the boat there were a duo of musicians who were quite entertaining:

There were two used book stores side by side on Queen St. in Charlottetown, one (The Bookman) was much more organized and user friendly than the other one (who's name escapes me) but the other store DID have this great book Field Guide to Cows:

There was a lot of eating, and GREAT eating during the few days we were in PEI. We spend some time on Saturday morning at the Charlottetown Market where I had a DELICIOUS salmon bagel (with lemon, dill, capers and diced onion). On Sunday we went to an awesome coffee shop in downtown Charlottetown where we had a very yummy macaroon:

Here is a mish mash of photos, we went to Pets Smart on Saturday as Angela and Dave (the lovely friends we stayed with) wanted to get something for their cat. In the process we found HILARIOUS cat and dog outfits which Angela and Greg posed for oh so well. You should also notice the super cheesy "mussel shirt" and Greg hanging out in a hammock:

Again, there was a lot of eating and drinking. We stopped by the Gahan House, a micro brewery in PEI, and I had a delicious sampler. Another place we went to had their drink menu on an iPad - pretty fancy. They also had a seafood 'soup' which is something I haven't been able to eat since 2007 given that whole lactose intolerant thing so it was pretty much the most amazing thing EVER. Oh and we also went to an olive oil tasting spot where I had some interesting tasting oils:

The main reason we went to PEI was for the Charlottetown Summerfest that was happening downtown. Sadly not many other people were interested in this festival and the attendance was ridiculously low. The first picture here was pretty much the crowd for the second band (of 4) for the day. There were a few people behind us and about 20 more in the beer tent area but really this duo (who were really entertaining) played to an audience of about 50. The band...or rather guy is Michael Bernard Fitzgerald, who made the most of the small audience, talking to and sometimes taunting individuals in the 'crowd'.

After MBF played Mardeen took the stage and the crowd grew perhaps by about 20 people. Still pretty tiny. They played a great set as per usual and as soon as they cleared the stage a bunch of keen Hey Rosetta fans took their places at the front of the stage. It was like a magnet pulled them close. The time between sets the crowd still hardly grew, it wasn't until about 5 minutes before Hey Rosetta took the stage did it really feel like we were at a concert and people were reasonably close to each other:

At the time I thought these were two separate churches (in Charlottetown) but now after looking at them I think they are the same place. Regardless this is a beautiful church:

On the way back to Nova Scotia (again we took the ferry) we had some time between when we arrived at the terminal and when we had to board the boat. So we headed over to a field to play some frisbee and I took some snaps along the way of the fishing paraphernalia and the sandy beach:

We had a lovely weekend and are really keen to bike to PEI for our next visit.

Newfoundland

A few friends have shared this video on Facebook and even though it's an ad it is beautifully done. The colours are amazing and I am impressed by how someone can capture them on film.



Being from Newfoundland this video makes me want to go back even more. Greg and I are hoping to visit sometime this summer so if we are lucky we'll have reasonable weather and maybe see some of these beautiful spots.

Labrador Conclusion: Last 24 Hours

After three great weeks in Labrador with incredibly hospitable people and awesome campers I'm back in Saint John. Now that I'm less than employed I have tons of time to do things and blog about them - lucky you!

But lets go back to the last 24 hours in Labrador. We had to end our time in Postville a day early to catch the only flight leaving the North Coast in order to catch our flight back to Halifax. That was a bummer as we had a rushed good-bye with campers. But at least we got to say good-bye!

We lazed around Goose Bay on Friday and decided to end our trip like we started, with hilarious drinks from Jungle Jims:

Strawberry Margarita & Chocolate Swirl
(or something like that!)

The next day was better, we got in touch with our camp contact from Nain who actually lives in Goose Bay and she showed us the town and we were even so lucky to make a homemade meal at her apartment - yay for cooking!

We visited this mish-mash of a store (it sold souvenirs, clothing, lingerie, toys, hunting/fishing gear and had a military museum in the basement!). So after some hilarious browsing we checked out the museum, here are some of our finds:

Bombs!

If there's a helmet lying around, I just need to put it on

Giant gun, doesn't it remind you of Walkers from Star Wars?

Front on view

NBD, moose antlers under a table

Moose head!

ROAR! Bear head!

After our romp in the store we headed down to an awesome craft store (Slippers and Things) that I actually had visited back in 2007 on my first visit to Labrador. And just like before the owner was one of the nicest people ever and fed us toutons (Brennen's first time) and encouraged us to eat as much as we wanted...YUM!

We headed to our new Goose Bay friend's house and made homemade spaghetti sauce and relaxed for a bit before heading to the airport.

Getting out of Goose Bay was a-OK, but we were flying through St. Johns then on to Halifax. That's where we encountered our troubles...sigh. Our plane was first just 2 hours late, mechanical issues from Ottawa where the plane was coming from, then it just kept getting later and later.

Top line of the screen, the plane wasn't schedule in until 1:05
so that meant we weren't going anywhere for awhile

Departure time, 1:30AM, note the time in the top right corner
it was already 1:36, but thankfully we were about to board

We eventually made it to Halifax, flew in at about 3:20 and I made it to my parents around 4AM. Despite this unfortunate ending to a great three weeks I had an AWESOME time and hope I get back to Labrador again!