Our Canadian Road Trip

Ever since I read an article in Vanity Fair entitled "Is Charismatic Québec City the Ultimate Utopia for Bibliophiles," my inner librarian has wanted to go there.  So when I mentioned the city as a possible place for a family vacation with our two adult children, Jillian jumped on my bandwagon and further proposed a side trip to Prince Edward Island to visit Green Gables Heritage Place, a Parks Canada national historic site, and the setting of Anne of Green Gables, a favorite childhood series read by both Jillian and I.  My husband Tim and our son Richard came onboard when we argued that Québec has the flavor of Paris without the expense and hassle of a transAtlantic flight.  The men conceded and a Family Road Trip was born!

Warning our offspring to pack light, Tim and I did the same and threw our bags into our compact SUV on July 5th for the first leg of our journey from our home in Greenville, SC, to Québec.  We were to pick up Jillian in Philadelphia on our way to an Albany, NY, rendezvous with Richard, who'd spent the 4th with friends in Montreal.  His buddies had unexpected scheduling complications that had left Richard, a dedicated fan, with four tickets to a concert in Boston by Phish, a four-man rock band formed in Burlington, VT, in the mid-eighties.

Phish on Dec.30, 2009 at the American Airlines Arena in Miami, FL
Left to right: Page McConnell, Trey Anastasio and Mike Gordon
Photo by Dan Shinneman

So we added the concert to our plans and made the pilgrimage to Boston.  I wish I'd taken photos during the concert in Fenway Park so I had evidence of our attendance, but I didn't.  However, it was a night to remember, especially since the concert was delayed an hour due to a thunderstorm that corralled the concertgoers in a crush underneath the stadium until the storm passed.

The House of Seven Gables
Photo courtesy of Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, Link

All of us had visited Boston before, but none had ventured further north along the coast.  We had plans to spend the night in Portland, Maine, and since I was the one tasked with creating the itinerary for this road trip, I factored in a stop at The House of Seven Gables, inspiration for Nathaniel Hawthorne's novel of the same name, in Salem, Massachusetts.  After all, this road trip was shaping up to be a literary one.  Jillian and I were excited to see it and even Tim found it interesting having read Hawthorne's classic in high school.

Crossing the line into Maine, we spent Sunday night in Portland where Richard scored his first lobster roll sandwich, a menu choice he repeated throughout the trip in his avowed quest to find the most flavorful specimen.  The Highroller Lobster Company set a standard that Richard was hard pressed to beat.

We also began a list of lighthouses we visited on this trip by making a stop at the very picturesque Portland Head Light.  This has the distinction of being Maine's oldest lighthouse; it was first lit on January 10, 1791.

Jillian had to work remotely from her job the next morning, leaving Tim, Richard and I to explore Portland.  We climbed the Portland Observatory for a panoramic view of the city and its harbor.

Then we visited Victoria House, a National Historic Landmark, built between 1858 and 1860 as a summer home for New Orleans hotelier Ruggles Sylvester Morse and his wife Olive.  It's considered one of America's finest examples of the Italian Villa style.

I loved its foyer with its elegant staircase.  And check out the molding on the ceiling!  Beautiful!

By noon Jillian had wrapped up her work so we got underway, leaving the Atlantic coastline for a quicker route through Maine.  Our next destination would be across the border in St. Andrews-By-The-Sea, New Brunswick, Canada!