Who recognizes the name “Anne Shirley”? If you think of the little orphan girl on Prince Edward Island, you would be correct. The first time I read Anne of Green Gables, I could not put down the book until I was on the last page. And I was not a child although it is considered a children’s book. Let me tell you how Anne found me.
In the early 2000s I watched the PBS series based on the book by Lucy Maud Montgomery, and Sunday night became my special time to watch Anne without fail. If circumstances somehow did not allow it, I walked around with a chip on my shoulder for days. Since I have always believed a book is better than a movie, I had to find out for myself, and I promptly took myself to the library. I was not disappointed, and Lucy Maud Montgomery immediately became one of my favorite authors.
And, then, in the late 2000s I joined a writing group on the internet called writing.com or WDC as we nicknamed it. There, by chance, I met a real-life living breathing person who called Prince Edward Island home. She, too, understandably was a huge fan of Anne Shirley and Lucy and never tired of talking about the beauty of the island. I was hooked and ever since I have dreamed of visiting there.
Although it is an island, there is a bridge over which you can cross to get there. It is named the Confederation Bridge and is around seven miles long, connecting New Brunswick to the town of Borden-Carlton. Otherwise, it is by water or air, including a 75 minute ferry crossing from Caribou, Nova Scotia to Wood Islands, P.E.I. I think I am partial to the ferry ride.
About a fifty-minute ride from Charlottetown, Cavendish Road leads to Green Gables, a nineteenth century farmhouse. Who can forget the orphaned Anne riding through an apple orchard for the first sight of her new home? Remember the preserves Anne and her friend made? There’s a place to visit to sample artisan preserves and even have tea.
Prince Edward Island has miles and miles of coastline, enough to satisfy a beach-lover like me, but not the kind of beach I am used to. Rocky and windy with names like Thunder Cove, and always with a coolness to the air so vivid in my imagination that I can taste the saltiness and feel the sting on my cheeks. So many lighthouses and little fishing villages to see, the artist or photographer would be drooling.
Lucy Maud Montgomery was actually left in the care of her grandparents after her mother died of tuberculosis when she was just a baby. Her father left her with them when he took off to Saskatchewan. Lucy spent the first thirty-seven years of her life at 8521 Cavendish Road with her maternal grandmother and grandfather and an aunt. Much of Anne’s life is Lucy’s life.
It would be like going back in time to visit these places, something I find intriguing, and the scenery which would be entirely foreign to me, pulls me like a magnet. And so, if I could go any place on earth, I think I would choose Anne’s place, Green Gables, on Prince Edward Island.
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