6/6/12

Rainy here in PEI. We’ve been drizzled on for the past two days and today was full on rain, not enough to make us stay home tho’. We’ve managed to tour the museum dedicated to Lucy Maud Montgomery which is in the house she spent most of her childhood in and was married in. It is still owned and run by her heirs and the furniture is as it was and as she wrote about in Anne of Green Gables (that’s for those of you who have no clue who she was, like me). The docent told us that many people still come to get married in the same parlor, using the same piano. We figure the room would hold maybe twenty people,  shoulder to shoulder. The town of Cavendish is fairly devoted to LM Montgomery and has an attraction in Avonlea complete with people in costumes reliving the old days. Unfortunately, it hasn’t opened yet for the season, plus it’s outdoors and the rain would have put the kibash on that. The museum was interesting tho’. I had to buy the book to reread it. I think the last time I saw it I was about eight. We’ve also toured the north shore which is on the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Apparently it’s quite the seaside resort during the summer; beautiful white sand beaches and “warm” water. (Not sure what “warm” is here. It’s been really cold the last few days, i.e. 7 or 8 degrees, Celsius of course.)  Had a great lunch of fish and chips at Richard’s and learned he uses Idahoan potato flakes with his batter. Interesting, because the primary crop here on the island is potatoes.  Potato fields everywhere. Just now they are being readied for planting. Potatoes from Canada is one of the things confiscated when you cross the border back into the U.S. The earth is very red here from an abundance of iron in the soil. It’s said that the red earth imparts a special flavor to the potatoes grown here. I bought a five pound bag to see. We’ll be eating potatoes for the next few days before we go back to the U.S. Today we went to the Potato Museum and learned all about the history of the potato and how they are propagated, grown, harvested, etc, etc. Now I know why they didn’t do so well in my garden.  After the Potato Museum we found a wool processing plant where they make yarn and turn it into blankets and things. They also sell yarn. Some of the equipment is ancient and they’re still using it.  Not sure what we’ll do tomorrow. We still have the ice cream factory, toy factory, and the gouda cheese factory to hit. More rain is forecast. The first sunny day is Friday and we’re leaving to go back to New Brunswick to watch the tide come up the Bay of Fundy. Guess I’ll do laundry.

House depicted in Anne of Green Gables.

LM is buried here in the Cavendish cemetary with many others but she gets top billing.

This fox seems to be a live resident of the cemetary. He's apparently being fed from the mini-mart across the street.

The PEI Potato Museum

Much of PEI looks like this with bright green grass against deep rust colored earth.