| Arrival back in North Sydney meant another spell of driving, this time the 170 miles to Caribou where a connection would be made onto the ferry over to Wood Islands on Prince Edward Island. En-route we pulled into a McDonalds where it was appropriate to at the very least try the McLobster sandwich on offer. Back on the road, we made it to Caribou in plenty of time for the 1800 departure. This service is operated by Northumberland Ferries (parent company of Bay Ferries) with their pair of ships, the ex-Marine Atlantic Holiday Island of 1971 and the Confederation from 1993. Our sailing was on the latter and she is a fine modern ship, rather similar to many of the smaller Norwegian ferries – a good comparison being something like the Vestfold of 1991. Indeed, whilst the builder's plate claimed credit for Pictou Industries, it seems that the hull itself may have come from the Kvaerner yard in Norway. One bonus was that, like the tolls on the Confederation Bridge to the west, ferry fares are only paid when exiting the island. I don’t suppose this is usually much of a problem since most people once on PEI have inevitably to return to the mainland via these two southern connections; instead however we had a rather different escape plan. This would involve heading northwards once more, this time to the Îles-de-la-Madeleine with C.T.M.A. |
