Confederation Trail: Endurance, Exertion, and Exhaustion

Our ride on the Confederation Trail on Prince Edward Island, Canada, actually began three years ago when Susan, our daughter Megan Tilton, and I paid a visit to that beautiful island province.  As we toured the island, we noticed a sign at the trailhead in Tignish that said Confederation Trail.  Then as we traveled about the island we kept seeing where the trail crossed the highway.  We researched the trail and learned that it was a rail trail that traversed the entire island from Tignish to Elmira for a total of 273 kilometers or 170 miles.

Most of our sightings of the trail were on fairly level ground.  Though the eastern half of the island was a little hilly, we figured that the rail trail itself could not be too difficult.  Later research showed that there were indeed hills, but nothing greater than a two-percent grade.  How hard could that possibly be?  We learned.

We left Megan’s home in Little Elm, Texas, on July 21, 2019, and traveled through Elizabethtown, Kentucky, and Albany, New York, on our way to the Canadian border and on to Summerside, Prince Edward Island.  Because of time constraints, we made the trip in three days, meaning that we spent about 12 hours a day on the road not counting stops along the way.

Endurance

We began our ride on Wednesday, July 24, at about 6:45 a.m. Atlantic Time.  We passed through the towns of Alberton, Elmsdale, O’Leary, Wellington, and ended our day’s ride 70 miles later in Summerside.  We were at an elevation of 174 feet when we left Tignish and climbed to 450 feet at Elmsdale.  There may have been higher elevations, but Elmsdale was the highest point that I recorded.

  

Our first real stop was in O’Leary where we met a young couple from British Columbia.  They had decided to ride their bikes on the Atlantic provinces and were camping along the way.  I think they were little more hardcore riders than we were.

Wildlife on this leg of our journey included a Garter Snake, several birds including yellow finches, chipmunks, and a fox.  We saw the fox just east of Wellington.

Several benches and small pavilion covered picnic tables were along the path, located about every two or three kilometers.  They became welcome sights as we continued along our way, especially on the second and third days.

Exertion

We left Summerside at 6:00 a.m. on Thursday.  Our motel was located in Summerside, so when we arrived the previous day we simply rode to our motel, then left from our motel on Thursday.  On this day we passed through Kensington, Emerald Junction, Hunter River, Winsloe, and ended at Tracadie.  Our elevation at Sunnyside was 260 feet and we had climbed to 646 feet a little more than an hour-and-a-half later in Kensington.  Tracadie has an elevation of 397 feet.

This second day of our journey saw lots of up and down hill riding.  One peak reached 1033 feet and the second-highest peak was at 984 feet.  This would have been a 590 feet climb from the beginning of our ride in Tracadie.  Though these were two-percent grades, they were on the order of seven to nine kilometers long.  There were not as many benches and picnic tables along this second stretch of the day’s ride of 52 miles.

We saw a huge rabbit outside of Kensington.  Other than birds and chipmunks, the only other animal we saw was a red-bellied brown snake.

We were met with a pleasant surprise at Emerald Junction.  A rest area was located near a community center that, though it was closed, had a nice clean restroom open and accessible.

Prince Edward Island has a reputation for its potatoes, and we saw hundreds of acres of potato fields along the way.

We made a lunch stop at Hunter River where there was a nice park adjacent to the trail.  Hunter River is situated on a hill and all the businesses in town were downhill from the park where we stopped.  We were sorely tempted to go down the hill to the businesses, but the immediate thought came to mind that we would have to climb the steep hill back up.  We chose not to go down, though I’m sure the reward would have been worth it.

At about kilometer 168 we saw a couple of youngsters with a mother at a lemonade stand at a road crossing.  We couldn’t help but stop and buy a couple of cookies and a fruit smoothie.  The kids were cute, but I have a feeling that we may have been their only customers for the day.  Refreshment was not the only thing we picked up at the lemonade stand.  It was here that we learned that Tracadie is not pronounced Tra-CAY-dee, but is TRACK-a-dee.

Susan picked us up at Tracadie at 5:20 p.m. and took us back to Summerside.

Exhaustion

We returned to Tracadie on Friday to resume and finish our ride to Elmira at the eastern end of the trail.  The ride began with a long uphill stretch.  We traveled up toward St. Peter’s Bay where we saw lobster boats in the bay.  We also stopped for fish and chips at St. Peter’s Bay.

We noticed that there was a variety of scenery across the island.  Whereas the western part of the island is quite forested, the last 48 miles of our ride was marked with ponds, lakes, and ocean inlets.  There were not quite as many trees along this leg of the ride.  We didn’t see quite as many people along this stretch of the trail either.  In fact, we saw a woman who regularly rides a few miles of this part of the trail who informed us that we were only the second riders she had seen all summer long.

This part of the trial was not as well maintained, but was certainly passable.  Though the elevation was not as high as the previous day’s ride, we climbed to at least 650 feet before we reached our destination in Elmira, elevation 466 feet.  Yes, the last couple of kilometers were downhill, thankfully.

There is a railroad museum at Elmira.  Unfortunately, it was closed.  However, just a few miles away from the end of the trail there is a lighthouse at the tip of the island.

It was a great experience.  It was hard but it wasn’t bad.  The days were long.  In hindsight, this would have been a much better ride in September or early October.  It is debatable whether we should have started at the east end and ridden west instead of the way we went.  Prevailing winds were at our back most of the time, though we could certainly feel it when it was in our face.  Also, in hindsight, had we had more time it would have been a much easier ride had we taken at least four days, if not five or six days to ride.  On the other hand, it was a challenge – a challenge that we met and I’m grateful for having had the experience.

The best part of the ride was spending time with my daughter.  There really is no other way to express it other than to say that the ride was about family.