Summerside

Summerside, the second-largest city on PEI, has an attractive waterfront with a beach and boardwalk in the west end. It has a fine collection of heritage homes, too, many of them erected around the turn of the 20th century when Summerside was the headquarters of a virtual gold rush based on silver-fox ranching (a small municipal museum tells that tale). Today fishing and potato processing are more profitable enterprises—though good fish-and-chips spots are curiously in short supply. Happily, lobster is plentiful in early July during the 10-day Summerside Lobster Festival.