Leaving Newfoundland, and Canada Day evening on PEI

Fireworks warmup from some residents across the bay in PEI

Friday Jun 30

After a quiet night boondocking in Port Aux Basques, we were up early and heading for a nearby breakfast stop. The ferry check-in process went smoothly as it usually does, and we pulled away pretty much at the scheduled 11:45 Nfld time.

It was pretty foggy early on:

Looking out a rear window from our lounge seats

 

But mostly cleared up later on:

A sister ship on its way

 

We had to wait about 10 minutes when docking, as the above ship hadn't left yet. Our crossing took only about 6 hours, faster than expected, so the other ferry was still in the dock when we arrived. Otherwise the crossing was uneventful, which is good! We were unloaded by 6:30 ADT (Nova Scotia time, 1/2 hour less than Nfld time).

Because of the ferry timing, we simply "checked in" at a Sydney Walmart for the night.

 

 

Saturday July 1

We expected to get a campsite for the night somewhere Saturday, and get to PEI on Sunday. We forgot about this being a Saturday night of a long summer weekend, but were reminded when we couldn't find an available campsite. Since we didn't fancy roughing it for a third night in a row, we decided to press on to our personal boondock space in Stratford PEI, at Nancy and Pat's place. Nancy is Cathie's sister.  Nancy and Pat were out visiting when we arrived, as expected, but returned in the early evening.

Each year on July 1, Charlottetown celebrates with a day of activities, topped off by a fireworks show at dusk. We got a fine view across the water to Charlottetown where the fireworks are based:

Quite a crowd gathers, just down the road from N&P's place

Lots of families here with their kids, watching across Charlottetown harbour

Here's a 1-minute video clip of some of the main event fireworks:

 

We expect to be here until we start heading home Wednesday morning.