St. Peters Bay

Much of today was among the most enjoyable cycling of the trip thus far.

We got up early and, foregoing breakfast other than a cup of coffee, were on the road by 8:15. The idea was to be done with any road cycling before the tourists came out to wreak havoc. It turned out to be a good plan. We had the wind on our starboard quarter for much of this first leg and saw very little traffic. After about 11 km, we rejoined the Confederation Trail at Tracadie Cross and turned east toward St. Peters Bay, with the wind now fully astern.

Goodbye, Dalvay

The trail in this section is mostly quite good aside from a few soft sections, and we made pretty good time. By 10:15, we had reached Mt. Stewart, where, as our server at Dalvay the evening before had informed us, there was a good place to breakfast. We didn’t even make it to the place in question, there being a lovely little bakery/cafe at the interpretive centre right on the trail, which served us a lovely breakfast. We also picked up some cookies and buns for lunch.

Around the time we were finishing breakfast, some other cyclists, whom we had met briefly at Dalvay, came in, all wet – it had started raining not long after we stopped to eat. Our early start time was looking like an even better decision now! Though we were ready to go, we decided to wait out the rain and were chatting with some cyclists from a tour group when the baker pulled a batch of fresh cinnamon rolls out of the oven. Fortune was clearly smiling on us today; although we were quite full from breakfast, we could not resist the temptation to share a freshly baked cinnamon roll – delicious!

In our nearly seven weeks total of cycle touring thus far, we have been extremely fortunate weather-wise; we have only been seriously rained on twice in all that time. Today was another example of our luck. By the time we were back on the trail, the rain had stopped completely. Our next stop was Morell and its grocery store, where we picked up some veggies and fruit for the road. But it was only just after noon, and we were still quite full from breakfast, so we pushed on to our ultimate destination of St. Peters Bay. We checked into the “inn” (rather slim pickings in this town, unfortunately) and had a rest.

The ride on the trail today was just lovely. We had a pretty fierce tailwind the whole way, which made the ride much easier – though the salt marshes around Mt. Stewart were teeming with mosquitoes, and that delightful tailwind also meant that the bugs were travelling at the same speed we were: For 3 or 4 kilometres, there was much swatting and swearing. But the scenery, especially as the trail swept alongside the bay, was striking, and we were greeted with many a picturesque view, some interesting birds (including an immature bald eagle), and lots of pretty wildflowers blooming alongside the path.

Rolling into St. Peters Bay

Our accommodations were not particularly inspiring and there’s not a lot to do or eat in the town – which made the end of the day somewhat of a letdown, but nothing a few chapters of Anne of Green Gables couldn’t fix. We’ll be up early again tomorrow, since much of our route is on roads before we rejoin a southern branch of the Confederation Trail that will take us to Montague.

Another gorgeous day comes to an end on PEI