Trip Stats
- Total trail mileage: 729.2k / 453.1 miles
- 31 walking days / 4 rest days
- 15 days with walks 20 to 25k
- 10 days of walking > 25k
- Walked alone about 80% of the time
- Other exercise included walking (34.7k / 21.6 miles) and biking (53.5k / 33.2 miles)
Things we would change: adding a rest day at the end of the first week and wearing ASICS or Hokas from the beginning of the trip (nothing beats walking on gel)! See Considerations section below.
Best Experience Ever
The experiences along the way and the trip itself exceeded all of my expectations — the people were amazing, the food was delicious, and the scenery was fantastic. Our mapping app was excellent and our treasured items were the umbrella and Kula cloth.That said, it was hard. The hardest thing we have ever done.
Thank You PEI
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| Our 31st day on the trail! |
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| Island Walk finishers #120 and 121! |
Billy for picking us up from the airport, introducing us to Charlottetown, hosting us at your home and walking us to the start of the trail.
Hannah for bringing us an IW passport and for letting us test the new IW app!
Brenda at All Star Cresting for being awesome and letting us try things on and for shipping our items to Oregon.
Alan on New Argyle Road for the raspberries and water!
Stephen and Sanana for being very kind PEI Rural Transit drivers and taking good care of us.
Susan at Oxley House for being flexible and sending us off with a great packed breakfast so we could walk before it got too hot!
Sheldon for coming to greet us at Richard's and welcoming us to the Island Walk.
Grant, the guy hanging out with his buddies working on an engine across the road from IW Section #3 marker, who gave us a ride into Borden-Carleton.
Kapiz the owner of Island Pizza who took the time to check on us, invite us in, give us Gatorade and a washroom while he and his crew were busily preparing for their grand opening.
Reverend Compton at the Free Church of Scotland for the water, washrooms, and hospitality.
Sigrid and Perry who lived next door to our Airbnb and invited us over for cocktails and conversation in Summerside.
Callie at SportChek who helped Therese get everything she needed for a great bike trip around the island with her new bike Anne.
Fred and Linda for giving us your address when I met you at the College of Piping!
CJ who took Therese and Anne from Summerside up to the trailhead in Wellington in his pickup truck.
Jo-Anne who had reached out and told us to let her know if we needed anything and when we did gave us an early morning ride from O'Leary to Ellerslie and brought us delicious tasting muffins for the trail!
Ellerslie Rite Stop for the washroom and the most delicious chicken salad sandwich ever (says the predominantly vegetarian eater).
Marion, the lady we met at the restaurant at the Potato Museum, who took us to the grocery store and back to our Airbnb in O'Leary.
The sock angel who retrieved my sock from the road near Roseville and returned it to me as I walked along Rte 14 just north of the 151 in Section 9.
Laurie from Tremblay's Market for the hot coffee, kindness and conversation.
Marie for the water refill near Pleasant View when I was just a couple of kilometers from my destination for the day.
Todd and Heather at Thistlebloom B&B for being exceptional hosts and wonderfully thoughtful cooks and conversationalists.
Lobster fishers Barbara and Bobby for the water and washroom as we walked down the road.
Tignish Tina for telling Barbara we were walking by, for picking us up from the trail, taking us to the grocery store, getting us to/from dinner, and for answering all of our questions about things we had seen along our route.
Bobby for a giving me a ride back to the trail as we left Tignish.
Kelly, the Alberton librarian, for checking on me on the trail and setting me up with Jim for a tour.
Jim, a patron of the Alberton library, for the tour of Northport.
Michele at La Petite France for washing our clothes and letting us use the clothesline.
Jo-anne for the ice water and cookies at our first rest stop, for bringing Therese a "belt" at our second rest stop, and taking her for a tour to cool off.
Al, the nice man in the yellow house on Rte 12 just past the 142, who gave me ice water and let me use his garden hose to wet my head down on a very hot day.
Jo-Anne for returning Therese to the trail, walking up the trail to meet us near Portage(!), taking us to Dillon's for pizza, and then to our Airbnb in Tyne Valley.
Kathy in Tyne Valley for the 6am shuttles, for picking us up at the end of the day, and for being fun to hang out with. And for letting me plop down on her lawn chair when I walked over that first day to say hello!
Jo-Anne for taking us to the Ship Building Museum and the Lennox Island Culture Center and for bringing ingredients and making us mussels for dinner at our Airbnb! And for the souvenir PEI pins.
Sam the tour guide for the ride from the Bideford Parsonage over to the Shellfish Museum.
Deanna's husband who took us from the Shellfish Museum back to Tyne Valley.
Daryl who answered our plea for a ride at the Tyne Valley Post Office back to our Airbnb.
Kathy for picking us up from the Acadian Museum after we walked the trail and for dropping us and all of our stuff off at the Slemon Park Hotel!
Kim at Slemon Park Hotel for being super awesome, giving us tons of bottled water and laundry detergent, and for taking me back to Miscouche so that I could resume my trek on the trail where I left off the day before.
Kendra for the Kensington welcome treats!
Dara for the brief walk, visit, and ride from the trail to the Home Place Inn.
Beth at Home Place Inn for making us breakfasts to go so that we could get an early start on our day of Anne adventures.
Kendra for the ride from the trail to the Anne of Green Gables museum.
The family from Québec who we will never forget — we loved the ride in your RV on the red roads back to the trail!
Fred and Linda in Stanley Bridge for twine, duct tape, toe things, a bike tuneup, and rides to the museum and the bike trail. And for the key chains and the big hug on the highway!
David, the owner of the Rustico Resort, for the invitation to come in, use the washroom, and enjoy a cup of coffee on him.
Judy, who we met at Roe's, who took my pack the last 6k to Dalvay on a hot afternoon.
Paula and Pat for the late night bike pick up and for taking Therese from St Andrews to St Peters on a stormy day!
The nice lady in Morell who gave me $20 and told me her address should I need a place to stay the night while I was eating my lunch under cover of the Morell Co-op waiting for the storm to end. I've passed the $20 along to Billy to help the homeless in Charlotttetown.
Alan and Flint for the ride from North Lake to Elliot's General Store for some shopping!
Tracy and Dave at the North Lake Beach Motel for being so organized and getting us shuttled around. And for the tuna report so that we could go over to the harbor master office to see the big catch come in!
The public relations guy who gave me a ride from the East Point lighthouse back to the trail.
Janine for the ride from the Basin Head museum back to the trail and for the description of the trail I was about to walk.
Bryson who stopped by to see us in Souris and who randomly checked in on us by text throughout our trip.
Shirley in Souris for the fun, insisting that we stay for the 50/50 drawing, and having breakfast with us. And for the souvenir Canada pins.
To the eight people who picked me up and transported me on my Magdalen Island adventure out to Grande-Entrée and back.
Shirley for being there for our return on the Magdalen Island Ferry to take us back to the Shanty Stay to retrieve Anne.
The realtor at the open house on Rte 310 near Eglington for the water.
Pauline and Roger for being wonderful hosts in Cardigan, shuttling us, the nice visit, and the little glass of something special.
Krista who picked me up at the Sturgeon United Church and dropped me at the the EcoHostel after a long day of walking even though it wasn't on her way to where she was going.
The EcoHostel host who gave me a ride back to the Sturgeon United Church after my earlier failed hitching attempts.
Troy the lobster fisher who picked me up at the ESSO in Murray River and took me to Murray Harbor.
The construction worker on the way to Nova Scotia who picked me up at the bridge in Murray Harbor and gave me a ride back to the ESSO in Murray River.
Judy, who we met earlier in our trip at Roe's, for the ride from the trail to the Red & White for groceries, a quick tour of Lord Selkirk Park, dropping us at Rachel's Cottage, and for bringing Therese back to retrieve her bike at the Fodhla House the next day.
Terry the construction worker who took me from the Red & White back to the trail in Iona.Charlie at the Fodhla House for bike sitting!
Jo-anne for picking us up from the trail, getting us to dinner, arranging for us to stay with her brother Paul at the family dairy farm, breakfast, and for getting us back to the trail the next morning!
Billy for walking out to Fullerton's Creek Conservation Park to meet us on the trail and escort us back to Charlottetown to complete the Island Walk as we had started it.
Considerations
I did a lot of reading and research in preparing for the trip. The Island Walk website laid out the walk very well, even breaking down the walk in terms of terrain:
- 51% trail and red clay roads
- 41% grassy or paved shoulder of secondary roads
- 8% busier secondary roads
A couple of things to keep in mind should you do the walk:
1. Use an offline map and check your location regularly. A few times the official IW sign was missing and we were glad we had kept an eye on the map and knew where to turn.
The GPX file of the trail is available on this page of the IW website. If it is not available, contact the IW staff.
2. The "grassy shoulder walking" didn't happen because condensation on grass = wet shoes. Plus it is easier to walk on the asphalt than the uneven shoulder. I wasn't prepared for the day to day asphalt walking and it was hard on my feet.- The Confederation Trail was relatively flat.
- There was a red road in Section 2 that was pretty steep.
- There were roads that had long gently sloping hills; if you walk hills at home, you will not have any problem.
The busiest parts of walk we experienced were in these sections:
- Section 1: Leaving Charlottetown
- Section 3: Rte 1A going into Summerside (there is a longer route that avoids the worst of it, but we opted for the shorter way)
- Sections 10 and 11: Alberton area
- Sections 16 and 17: Cavendish, Rustico and Brackley areas (lots of tourists)
- Section 24: Leaving Souris on Rte 2
- Section 32: Trans Canada Hwy coming into Charlottetown
6. If you go, be sure to say hello to the trail angels for us!
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| Therese and Lynn from Eugene, Oregon |
