POSTING #120

Memories of Prince Edward Island

The recent visit of Will and Kate (aka the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge) to Prince Edward Island brought back memories of trips I have made to that lovely island over the years.

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During the early fall of 1964, we were back in Canada for home leave after a posting in the United Kingdom. Following a holiday, I set out with 3 other foreign service officers on a cross-Canada re-familiarization tour. We arrived in PEI in September just as the province was getting ready for a visit by the Queen and Prince Phillip that would take place in October. The trip was to commemorate the centennial anniversary of the Confederation Conference held in Charlottetown in 1864.

The province and its people were excited by the visit and were using a lot of elbow grease to make a good impression on the royals. Houses were being painted, trees were  being trimmed, lawns and flower beds were being weeded, fertilized and watered.

That kind of thing.

On our first day on the island, we were being taken to a brand new seafood processing plant a few miles outside of Charlottetown that the Queen and Prince Phillip were to visit. As we drove along an asphalt  road, we could see a large red brick building on a hill---the new factory.

As we got close to the factory, our host, the manager of the local Canada Immigration office, pointed to the road. He said that it had been a gravel road but it had just been paved---especially for the royal visit.

Smiling, he said that the paving stopped just over the crest of the hill. Islanders felt that it was important to put on a good show for the royals, but there was no need to get carried away.

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As the day of touring plants and businesses came to an end, we asked our host if he could recommend a restaurant where we could have 'a good feed of lobster'. He shook his head. No restaurant at the time served lobster---fish sticks maybe, but no lobster. Residents went down to the dock, bought lobsters from the fishermen, took them home and cooked them.

Church groups occasionally had lobster dinners for tourists but there was none scheduled for that time.

We groaned and complained about how we had been dreaming about tender lobster bits dipped into melted butter.

Our host took pity on us, said he would arrange a dinner that we could eat back at the motel. He asked us what we would like for dinner. Our menu was simple: lots of lobster, some beer and perhaps some pie.

Leave it to me, he said,

Will you join us, we asked. Of course, he said.

Our first stop was at the dock where he arranged with one of the fellows to boil some lobsters. We would be back to pick them up.

Then it was off to the provincial beer store. There were some scruffy looking men loitering outside the beer store. They stopped us as we were about to enter.

"Are you from off the island?", one asked. We said we were.

"Well then, could you buy us some beer." He explained that locals could only buy a certain amount of beer a month, whereas visitors could buy as much as they wanted. He held out some bills.

They looked thirsty and our inclination was to be good Samaritans and help them. At that point, our host who had been watching from his car, came over and shooed them away. He explained that they didn't want the beer for themselves, but that they were working for a local bootlegger. Any beer they cadged went into his stock.

We mused about the differences between Quebec, which we had just visited---where beer was sold freely in grocery stores---and PEI (or Ontario for that matter).

We got our box of 24 Molson's Ex and headed for a local 'greasy spoon' restaurant for an apple pie, which we knew would be made of canned apples with a cardboard crust---it was---but what the hell, you couldn't have a 1960s dinner without some pie.

Then to the dock for the lobsters and some melted butter.

Back at the motel, our host produced a bottle opener (this was before screw tops) some nut crackers and picks. And we started some serious lobster cracking.

I'm not going to say it was the best meal I have ever had, but it was clearly the best lobster dinner ever.

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Later on, after I had left the Foreign Service, I went often to the Island for conferences and meetings. I loved the island and the people, and decided that Pat should have a chance to enjoy it.

Leaving the kids with a motherly woman who was used to looking after them, we flew to PEI for a holiday at the family-run Shaw's Hotel (which is still in business---after 150 years!) 

It was early in the season and we were the first guests that year.

I had of course told Pat about the wonderful PEI lobsters so we didn't have to look at the dining room menu. It was going to be lobster.

The young and cheerful server went off to the kitchen with our order. She came back with a delicious salad and some fresh rolls.

We finished the salad and waited. There was laughing in the kitchen but no lobster.

The server came back and took our empty salad plates. The lobster would be ready soon, she said.

And we waited some more. The laughing in the kitchen continued.

Finally, as I was about to knock on the kitchen door, our server came back, flushed from laughing. She said that the chef for the season had just arrived on the Island that day. "He's from Winnipeg", she smiled, "and doesn't know how to cook lobsters!".

We discovered later that he was a good looking young man, and our server and the other young women in the kitchen had obviously enjoyed teaching him how to boil lobsters.

The lobsters when they came were fine, but perhaps not quite as good as the lobsters at the motel.

Must have been the motel's ambiance.

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After breakfast one morning at Shaw's , we joined an elderly local for coffee. He had lived his whole life on the Island, and told some marvellous stories about growing up on PEI.

We mentioned our lobster dinner experience and he laughed about a chef from the West who didn't know how to cook lobsters.

He said that when he was growing up, his family was poor but they never went hungry---they always had lobsters and potatoes. His father had a few lobster pots and a large potato garden.

He said that he and his brothers and sisters had always gone off to school with lobster sandwiches for lunch. He remembered asking his mother why they couldn't have bologna sandwiches like the other kids. She had explained that bologna was too expensive for them.

He looked out the window and mused, "Who would have thought?"

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In the early 1970s, while working as a social policy officer at the Privy Council Office, I was part of a team looking at ways of increasing the income of  what at the time were called 'have-not provinces'.

PEI was one of the provinces.

The team was looking at a variety of solutions including adjustments to  the equalization payments made by the Federal Government, and different kinds of development assistance.

In the midst of this work, I found a survey that had just been conducted by a reputable  Toronto firm in which they had asked Canadians to rate their level of happiness. The survey found that the happiest people in Canada lived in---you guessed it, Prince Edward Island.

I suspect that if the survey were repeated today, the results might well be the same.

What is that old saying: 'Money doesn't bring happiness'.

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See you on September 4th for Posting #121 with more stories from our family’s universe! If you have comments or suggestions, please leave a comment at the bottom of this posting,  or email me at johnpathunter@gmail.com.

On August 28th, you may like to check out the next Posting of The Icewine Guru. http://theicewineguru.blogspot.com/