The weather forecast for our 6th day of riding came in much the same as the previous day’s –rainy and cold. Even though we had booked a campsite at Stanhope Campground, we decided early in the day to skip a wet camping experience, and instead booked a room at a nearby hotel in Brackley Point for that night.
Our route for the day was mostly on the Confederation Trail, with the final third, or so, on secondary roads to get us to Brackley Point. In total, it was due to be a 55km (32mi) day. Not too long! You can find our Komoot log of the day’s journey:
Summerside to Brackley Point
https://www.komoot.com/tour/t76035870?ref=atd
We took our time getting ready in Summerside. First we went for breakfast, as our hotel did not offer complimentary breakfast. Then we made our way to the Summerside farmers market, where we saw a wide variety of local products, including beer, honey, meats, cheese and baked goods. But being PEI, one could not leave out local potatoes! Fruit was nowhere to be found, so we made one final stop at the market just on the edge of town.
By this point, it was nearly noon, but we were so full from our breakfast, there was lots left in the tank. The rain was also mostly holding off, and we were left with the same misty drizzle we’d had plenty of yesterday.
The landscape became quite rolling and hilly, and we wondered how long until we hit the massive hill that Komoot had plotted on our route. It turned out, we had already been on it for some time. Being a rail trail, the hills are all so gradual and equally graded, we had been on what was likely a 2-3% grade for almost 2km (1.3mi)! Hoping to be rewarded for our climb with a view, we pedaled on up. At the “crest” of the hill we crossed a nondescript, tree-lined dirt road and headed back down without much of a view.
As we headed down, we met up with a father walking his two young daughter’s down the trail. The girls set about decorating our bikes with flowers, and showing off their somersaulting skills, while we chatted with their dad about life here in PEI and how it compares to Ottawa and the Bay Area. After nearly an hour of chit-chatting, the girls had to go eat lunch, and we had to go make up some miles, so we said our goodbyes and headed off.
Not soon afterwards, Chris and I made it to the end of our journey on the trail, and into the town of Hunter River. We found an idyllic little cafe right up on the valleyside and decided to have some lunch. Tasty cinnamon buns and some chowder later, and we were good to head out again.
This last part of our day, was really hilly and fun to ride. The climbs weren’t too steep for the most part, but boy were they long! A couple times the spray off my rear fender was enough to soak Chris as we raced down to the bottoms of the hills.
Before too long, we made it into Brackley Point and found our hotel. The room wasn’t great, but it was dry and had a shower, so we were happy.
It wasn’t until later that we realized there was no place to eat at the hotel or anything else within a kilometer (1/2 mile) of the place. We decided to try walking over to the closest dairy dip down the highway. Making the walk, we found that both sides of the highway had been turned into swamp with all the rain, and were constantly pestered by swarms of mosquitoes! When we finally arrived at the dairy dip, we found it closing up an hour early, what with the bad weather and lack of customers. We resigned ourselves to walking back to the hotel and eating from our own food stocks.
The next day’s ride was also looking like another wet one, but we decided to add a little detour through the National Park, and went ahead and booked a hotel for the next night too, this time in St. Peter’s Bay.