Well! Way back in June (can't believe it's been over a month already!) this family of ours set out for a massive road trip. Destination PEI.
Here we are all chipper and happy on June the 24th ready for hours and hours of driving.
The happy faces didn't last the entire three days of driving. There was perhaps a moment(or a hundred) here and there of conflict, teasing, and tears. But that was just during the hours where we were crammed like sardines in the van. We knew that it would be a test of how well our dear children could get along - after all we fill all seven seats in the van . .. so there is not a whole lot of space to have some alone time. But driving was a necessity and part of the trip . . .and quite frankly . . . Jonathan and I enjoy a good drive. So, while the driving was probably the least favorite part of the trip for the kids, it got us to where we needed to be and we had a wonderful time and saw so many beautiful things.
We left home around lunchtime on Wednesday the 24th and made it just past Montreal before we called it a night. We stayed in a great motel - pool, beds, and delicious breakfast.
Happy kids!
We didn't really get a chance to practice our french too much -- most of Quebec seems to be bilingual, so ordering at Tim Hortons and McDonald's in English was fine . . . as long as you talked carefully and used good description .
These flowers were everywhere out East - from Quebec all the way to PEI and then all the way to Vermont too. (in purple, pink, and white) I wouldn't mind having them grow in our ditches!
Some Quebec scenery . . .
Day 2 we drove from Brossard Quebec to Moncton, NB. We usually waited till we were getting close to 7 or 8pm and then we'd start looking online for a motel. We stayed at Amsterdam Inns and Suites the second night and it was great too! It didn't have a pool, but we could use the one next door if we wanted to. We didn't end up having time b/c we wanted to get a good start on the day. The motel had a very dutch feel to it and I'm pretty sure a lot of the guests had some dutch in them. We really enjoyed our little visit here too.
Day 3 we went to Hopewell Rocks in New Brunswick. We hit it just right when the tide was low and we could head right down and walk the ocean floor.
This is one of the lookout points on the way down.
Walking the trail down to the ocean floor.
Someone offered to take a picture of the whole family . . .so here we are!
Looking down . . . you can see it was still really wet. We were there around 11am and high tide was not till 8pm, so we didn't end up sticking around to see that . . .even though all the brochures say you need to see both to really get the full experience.
Those are my people down there!
I loved the mud. It was lovely feeling it squish between my toes. Needless to say, not all of the kids remained perfectly clean!
There were some caves you could walk in/through a little bit. Some of the kids went in. The highlight for them was telling Karter there was a snake and scaring the living daylights out of him. He was not a happy boy at that point.
Can you see Kade?
The vegetation in the background was kind of cool. It was like little beads on vines. The boys couldn't resist a few plant wars with them.
Konnor and Jonathan
Getting all cleaned up and hosed off at the top again!
Pit stop to check out this airplane.
And then we headed for Nova Scotia to where we would take the ferry. We got there about an hour before the ferry was scheduled to leave, so we parked the van in the line up and enjoyed a very beautiful evening while we waited.
Kev
And then it was ferry time!! This was a highly anticipated part of the trip for most of us!
Kylie was extremely nervous about the ferry (and the bridge too!). She was not 100% convinced that it was perfectly safe. As you can see from the picture below . . . her fears were very quickly overcome. It was neat to hear her pray that night at bedtime, 'Thank you for taking away my scares on the ferry. I don't know where they came from - myself or Satan, but thanks for taking them away and keeping me safe." Awwwww.
The one side of the ferry was very cold . . but this side where the sun was shining was beautiful. The kids did their share of exploring - checking out the high deck and the inside, but they spent most of the time here in the sun just enjoying the ride.
Kade and Kevin
Kade
Kylie
Konnor enjoyed his first boat ride too;)
And that brings us to the end of Part 1. Part 2 will be our days in PEI. (coming soon I hope!) I thought I better break this trip up into pieces b/c there are a fair amount of pictures and I want to take the time to record and remember some of the details and not rush through it.
