{"id":630,"date":"2015-06-24T22:35:32","date_gmt":"2015-06-25T02:35:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.7hannahs.net\/wordpress\/?p=630"},"modified":"2015-07-20T15:05:19","modified_gmt":"2015-07-20T19:05:19","slug":"day-48-victoria-pei","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.7hannahs.net\/wordpress\/blog\/2015\/06\/24\/day-48-victoria-pei\/","title":{"rendered":"Day 49 – Victoria PEI"},"content":{"rendered":"

Day 49 – Victoria, Prince Edward Island (Wednesday, June 24, 2015)<\/p>\n

Today was another 200km plus day.
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\nMiramichi was the absolute worst place for mosquitoes on my trip. \u00a0 I hear they like some people more than others. At Miramichi Campground swarms would follow me and drive me mad while kids were playing happily in their shorts and t-shirts.<\/p>\n

It rained during the night but stopped a few hours before dawn. I got up at about 5:30am to take a washroom break and made the error of leaving the tent open. \u00a0 When I got back I estimate there were 200 mosquitoes inside the tent. My attempts to kill them to get a bit more rest woke me up entirely. Thanks to the pests I packed up my tent, shook off the rain, and got on the road in great time.<\/p>\n

Nature served up just about perfect weather. It started quite wet but by mid morning the sky was partly cloudy and I was comfortable enough to cycle in my shorts for the first time in days. The weather was within just the right threshold of comfort.<\/p>\n

I started off following highway 11 from Miramichi Campground because it appeared by far the most direct route. Because there are no stops or restaurants on the main highway I was forced to take highway 134 which turned out a much better alternative.
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\nTraveling on 134 (and later 133) exposes the small business and homes of New Brunswick. Unlike Quebec, the \u00a0Acadian Peninsula of New Brunswick doesn’t go out of it’s way for tourism. There are practically no restaurants, or rest areas. Scenic areas which would have been promoted in many other places are left undeveloped.<\/p>\n

From then on I continued to take the secondary highways determined to find scenic gems or trails but nothing that I saw held a candle to the Route Verte in Quebec, \u00a0or the Waterfront Trail in Ontario. It is as if the people of New Brunswick are too busy surviving to enjoy life – or something more sinister.<\/p>\n

Generally everyone I talked to in New Brunswick was friendly. Even when their first language was french they went out of their way to be helpful. I notice that when I nodded hello in New Brunswick I seemed to always get a friendly nod back. (I had forgotten to mention that this was not true in Quebec. When I nodded I would often get a cold response as if I should have nodded in French. I even tried to nod differently – more subtly, with a French accent – but nothing seemed to work. And on rare occasions when people responded as I expected I immediately assumed that they were visiting from some other province.)<\/p>\n

A few interesting things that happened today:<\/p>\n

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  1. A large fly flew into my mouth. I immediately caught it in my tongue and spit it back out minus the wings as the occupants of a passing car watched with interest.<\/li>\n
  2. Because of the lack of restaurants I bought real food and discovered it was pretty good. Six muffins, four blueberry scones, two oranges, two apples and five bananas.<\/li>\n
  3. At 1pm at a critical fork I thought it would be nice to visit Prince Edward Island. PEI wasn’t on my original itinerary and it suddenly occurred to me that there was no good reason, after coming all this way not to see it. \u00a0Since touring PEI meant at least an extra day I immediately called Ann for permission. She said it would be ok only if I rode twice as fast the next day so off I went to PEI.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    I arrived at Confederation Bridge at about 5:30pm and had to wait almost an hour for the shuttle to take me to PEI. But now I find myself at Victoria Village Inn (a nice Bed and Breakfast) after eating a great supper at the Landmark Cafe in Victoria PEI.<\/p>\n

    Apparently the host at the B+B, Steve, teaches at the Culinary Institute of Canada in Charlottetown so I am looking forward to a great breakfast. I am told breakfast is at 8am so I can sleep in (don’t tell Ann.)<\/p>\n