Ready, Set...

This Friday, in a mere three days, my husband R.J. and I will hit the road for another big adventure.  We are heading to Prince Edward Island again. We made this trip for the first time in 2013, to celebrate our 30^th anniversary. We had the seed of the idea to drive all that way (nearly 2000 miles from our Rochester, Minnesota home) for ten years before the trip became a reality. The trip was unlike anything we had done before. First, it was just R.J. and me – no kids! Would we get bored with each other? (Nope!) Second, the trip was three weeks long – a week to get there, a week on PEI, and a week to get home. That was much longer than any other vacations we had taken. Would we get road weary? (Yup, but not bad!) Third, we were taking in some serious attractions along the way: the Baseball Hall of Fame, Acadia National Park, and Niagara Falls, in addition to the PEI attractions. Would we enjoy them? (Mostly.) That first trip was the stuff dreams are made of. As we approached the trip, we thought of it as a once-in-a-lifetime adventure. We learned a LOT as we traveled – what kind of attractions we liked the best, how long we could spend on the road in a single day and still be decent people, and what an amazingly beautiful and diverse world we live in! We absolutely loved our time on PEI, staying in the heart of Anne-land. For those of you who don’t get the reference, PEI is the setting for the Anne of Green Gables books by Lucy Maud Montgomery, and a lot of the tourism is Anne-driven. We love those books. Both R.J and I have read them many times. My dear husband spent the months leading up to our trip reading the stories aloud to me. That was a precious time. As we left PEI, I immediately wanted to return. We had no plans to do so at that time, and so tears kept creeping into my eyes on the day of our departure.

Us on our 30th anniversary trip to Prince Edward Island, at Covehead Lighthouse

Fast forward to 2018. We DID end up deciding to return to Prince Edward Island for our 35^th anniversary. It took a while to make the decision, and then we played around with the timing and other details after that. We took a different route there (through Washington, D.C. this time), spent longer at Acadia National Park, routed our trip through Nova Scotia so we could have the experience of riding the ferry to PEI, stayed on a different part of the Island, and traveled back by way of the Canadian side of Lake Superior before ending our excursion with a few days stay in Grand Marais, MN. By the end of our time in PEI, we had traveled on all the coastal drives around the Island, building off the ones we had traveled on the first trip. We returned to the Anne attractions and fully enjoyed our week in paradise. We had already decided that this should be an “every five years” event, so we left with thoughts of returning. There were no tears this time around, just a lot of joy.

Us on our 35th anniversary trip to Prince Edward Island, at Wood Islands Lighthouse

And now, another five years have passed and our 40^th anniversary is coming up on June 18. I am uncertain how time passes so quickly! We (mostly me) have been planning our current trip for at least a year and a half. In between our last trip and the current one, the world kind of fell apart. COVID happened and lots of people went crazy. International travel largely stopped. Canada was CLOSED! I am grateful to be out of the worst of it, but wow – the whole experience gave me a lot to think about. Also in these past five years, a few of my friends have lost spouses or have experienced life-threatening diseases/conditions. One of my biggest take-aways from all of that is that life is precious and should be lived and appreciated FULLY! So…for a few years, I had a thought in the back of my head that on our 50^th anniversary, we should invite the family to join us on PEI. With my new lens on the world, I began to think, “Why wait?” R.J. and I discussed it, and he approved of my idea to invite the family to join us this time around. We presented them with the idea at Christmas of 2021. We offered to fly them out to PEI for a week, so they could join us in celebrating our 40^th anniversary. We didn’t ask for any kind of a decision at that time – just wanted them to start thinking about it. They did. By the fall of 2022, we had a plan. Laura, Andrew, and their kids would join us. Joseph and David would be coming along as well. And although Emily and Eric knew they wouldn’t be able to make the trip, we understood that they would be cheering us on from home. As we planned our route, we decided to arrive at PEI a few days ahead of the family, so we could have some time alone there in addition to the family time. We added a fun hook for the return trip of water view stays every night. We will travel down the St. Lawrence River, with one night’s stay along the shore, and then stay on the shore of each of the Great Lakes. And then we will be home again, after 23 days (22 nights) on the road. It will be July.

At this point, the trip details are all in place and well-documented in my 11-page Google Doc. All that remains is to work two more days, complete countless small tasks, load up the car (the packing list is in the Google Doc), and hit the road. On “paper” the trip is over 4100 miles just driving to the destinations, without any tourism activities. It will be a LOT. I put a countdown app on my phone at 333 days, and somehow 330 of those days have vanished. For the past couple of months especially, I have been praying that I don’t wish away these days leading up to the trip. They have been full of great things!! I didn’t want my anticipation of the trip to outweigh my appreciation for each day, filled with family, friends, special events, and of course work.

The trip hasn’t begun yet, but when it does, I know it won’t be perfect. I know I won’t be perfect. But I also know that life at home isn’t perfect either. I think I am ready for an imperfect adventure! Prince Edward Island, we’re almost on our way! I have one last piece of advice from my 63 years on this planet and my 40 years of marriage. 

Life is short. Do the things.

The 8-mile Confederation Bridge that leads to Prince Edward Island