Fodor's Travel Talk Forums - My Charlottetown Canada Day Weekend

Hi everyone,
I just thought I'd write a mini trip report about our mini trip to Charlottetown, PEI, since I got many suggestions and ideas from this forum.

I went on Friday to join my SO who'd been there at a conference since Wednesday and since this was a long weekend, we thought it would be a good place for a nice, low-key, non-pressure type of getaway and that's exactly what it was.

We stayed at the Delta Prince Edward which is your standard contemporary hotel and it's right at the harbourfront. I chose it because it was listed in the Entertainment Book and I got a good rate for a room with a king bed overlooking the harbour (well, overlooking a roof first, then the harbour). The room was very large -- king bed, couch, table, windowseat. They could easily have fit a second king bed in there. The bathroom was fine with a great needle shower and nice amenities including a bathrobe but I do wish they'd stop using those yellow-ish bulbs and put some pink-ish ones in instead. There was also a coffee-maker, kettle, fixin's, iron, ironing board and hairdryer. I'd read one complaint on TripAdvisor that the beds were uncomfortable but I found ours heavenly and got some of the best sleep I'd had in months. Everything was very clean. One of the nice things about staying at the Delta was that it was so close to the harbour, where we were spending much of the weekend, that we could just run into our hotel to pick up a sweater or go to the washroom.

Our second choice of hotel would have been the Great George and it was really just a matter of getting the better price that put us in the Delta. We walked past the RG and the public rooms looked very charming though I have no idea what the bedrooms are like.

We didn't do much over the weekend. Charlottetown is small and cozy and that was just fine with us. We spent quite a bit of time at the harbourfront for the Canada Day events which were going on all weekend -- buskers, lots of music, the sand castle display, all the Anne stuff, Cows ice cream to be sure, and lots of other bad-for-you-but-great-to-eat fair food like funnel cakes and french fries.

On Friday night SO planned a special surprise for me and hired a driver to take us out to Shaw's Hotel (about a 20 minute drive) for dinner. Shaw's has a beautiful, traditional PEI dining room and it's very charming. We sat at the window overlooking the beautiful grounds, the stands of lupines, and the water and had a lovely dinner. We called our car just as we ordered dessert and the timing was perfect, and we had a lovely drive back to the hotel under the biggest, fullest, yellowest moon I've ever seen. I asked SO if he'd arranged that too and he modestly admitted that he had.

We browsed a few shops in town during the day, including Moonsnail Soapworks, which has some lovely things, and the interesting little new and used bookstore next door. Didn't buy anything at either place, though.

Aside from Shaw's, we ate at some great places. I got there midday on Friday and SO had already had lunch at the conference, so we just went across the street from the hotel to the Merchantman Pub where I had delicious lobster chowder -- pretty much a big bowl of buttery cream filled with bacon, potato and hunks of lobster. Delish!

We our best dinner was at the seafood place at the corner of Prince and Water, which is actually called the Prince-Water Corner Shop (or maybe the Water-Prince Corner Shop) which is right at the corner of -- you guessed it, Prince and Water. This is a wonderful place and really shouldn't be missed. We didn't see it listed on any of the tourist brochures so I was glad to have read about it here. It's a completely unassuming little place with great food and friendly service. We had the lobster dinner (mussels, lobster, a choice of their homemade potato salad, baked potato or fries, and dinner rolls) and what a fabulous meal it was! We'd walked by earlier that afternoon and thought to drop in and make a reservation for dinner and I was glad we did that because there was a little line-up by dinner time. They have quite a nice menu, so if you don't like lobster, you'll have plenty of other choices.

Sunday morning we had brunch at Clara's, a heaven of waffles, pancakes, omelets, and a fun place. Does anyone know if this is the same Clara's that's in Toronto? Sunday night we had a casual dinner at the Old Dublin Pub -- just your average pub food, although SO really liked the shepherd's pie -- but we really wanted to hear some trad music and we quite enjoyed that. We left before 10, though, because we wanted to go back down to the harbour where we heard a fabulous Eagles tribute band and then watched the great fireworks show.

The people of PEI are incredibly charming. We had wonderful, friendly service everywhere we went and everyone I spoke to at our hotel was quite concerned about my cold and I was told by everyone to 'just ask for anything you need'. And I especially liked the very charming woman who answered the phone when I called down to ask what the weather was going to be that day. Instead of getting what I expected, something like "19 degrees Celsius; sunny with a few cloudy periods" -- she said, "Well, dear, I had to put on a sweater when I left the house today. It was quite chilly when I went outdoors and I know you've got a bad cold, so you should be quite careful now. Now, would you like the temperature? And are you better with celsius or farenheit, dear?..." She was just darling!

All in all, it was a great, fun weekend. Try to go, as I did, when the gorgeous lupines are in bloom!