Coreen’s Trans Canada Trail: The People We Meet Along the Way

Cycling Prince Edward Island’s Confederation Trail 

Written by Coreen Hildebrand  

Our half-day adventure was about to begin. The early September weather couldn’t have been better: sunny but not too hot, with a few clouds overhead. Great for photos, I thought. 

My husband, Eric, and I had fond memories of biking this stretch of the Confederation Trail, along the Trans Canada Trail from St. Peter’s to Morell, eight years earlier, when I had just retired from teaching and was beginning my new life as a travel blogger. We couldn’t wait to do it again. 

We arranged bike rentals with Ed McKenna, owner of Confederation Trail Bike Rental Adventures. He even remembered us from our last visit. This time, he suggested e-bikes. 

“They’re very popular with our key audience,” he said with a wink. 

I wasn’t quite sure how to take the seniors reference, but being in our early 60s, we later appreciated the extra boost. That little bit of power behind our pedalling made our roughly 22-kilometre return ride feel easy and left us with plenty of energy for more exploring when we returned our bikes four hours later. 

We felt 17 again out there, but with the wisdom to stop often. I couldn’t believe the views. Had we appreciated them this much eight years ago? We were in our 50s then, so probably not, I mused. But we were certainly in the moment now. 

I noticed plenty of other mature cyclists taking breaks and looking around with that same appreciation. Naturally, I started chatting with them. 

That’s one of the things I’ve discovered since becoming a travel blogger. I began writing about my travels to share the beauty of the Maritimes, but the stories of the people we meet stay with me just as much as the places we visit. This ride was no different. 

Photo credit: Coreen Hildebrand / maritimesmaven

The people along the trail 

The conversations started casually. We talked about birds we had spotted, where to find the best bite in Morell and, yes, even a little politics.  

Ingrid and James Diaz from South Carolina were visiting parts of PEI and Nova Scotia, combining two of their passions: coastal travel and genealogy. “I have had so much enjoyment from tracking down ancestors, their immigration stories, where they lived, their occupations, etc.,” Ingrid told me. 

One of her goals was to find the gravesites of three sets of grandparents, including her fourth great-grandparents, who were born in the 1700s and lived in Mount Albion. She found their graves at a Church of Scotland cemetery in Birch Hill. 

I shared that Eric’s maternal grandparents came from Birch Hill and nearby Tyne Valley. A few years ago, I had wandered through those same old cemeteries with my mother-in-law, looking for traces of her family. 

Suddenly, the ride felt much more personal. 

Photo credit: Coreen Hildebrand / maritimesmaven

Ingrid and James are avid cyclists, always looking for another trail. Ingrid had heard this section offered some of the prettiest water views and planned to visit the Greenwich Dune Trail as well. “The Confederation Trail is fabulous, isn’t it?! Those views!” 

I couldn’t have agreed more. 

I also met Mike and Cindy Holcomb from North Carolina, another couple with a great love for Canada, particularly Prince Edward Island and the Confederation Trail. They’ve been returning for years and, like so many visitors, had plenty of affection for the Island. 

Photo credit: Coreen Hildebrand / maritimesmaven

The conversation I almost missed 

“If you’re a travel blogger, you need to hear about this.” 

A young man called out from where he sat squatting against a bridge, his bike resting nearby. 

Eric had gone ahead but doubled back to see what was taking me so long. I stopped to listen. 

Joseph Williams told us about the Healing Spring between Cherry Hill and Abegweit First Nation, and its long history connected to the Mi’kmaq and later settlers. He shared the story of his four-times-great-grandfather, Bishop Angus MacEachern, who is said to have blessed the spring in the early 1800s. 

Then I asked what had brought him to the trail.  

His personal story poured out. 

Joseph had returned home after living away and getting into what he described as “a bad way.” He had been a heavy fentanyl user and had just completed detox. He told me about the dramatic changes in his weight and his determination to stay sober. 

Nature, he said, had helped him reconnect with God. He bikes the trail daily. He is only 29. 

Photo credit: Coreen Hildebrand / maritimesmaven

I congratulated him on his sobriety, wished him well and asked him to keep in touch. When I followed up recently, I learned Joseph is still doing well. I told him I regretted not capturing a photo of him, and he immediately sent me some to use. He said he had taken them to show his Ontario friends the progress he had made. 

“I’m not ashamed of my past,” he shared. “I am a firm believer that if you are transparent about your pitfalls in life, those who get a laugh at seeing you fail have no ammunition. As well, those who care may be inspired to make that change in their life.” 

I have thought a lot about Joseph. How I almost missed meeting him. How grateful I am that he called out. It reminded me to pay close attention to the people around me, including those we might otherwise overlook. 

More than a bike ride 

After that conversation, Eric and I rode for the next few kilometres mostly in silence. 

We had plenty to think about and a beautiful journey to enjoy. The Confederation Trail follows a former railway corridor across Prince Edward Island, offering a relatively flat route for cycling and walking through forests, farmland and communities. We rode red dirt trails bordered with wildflowers and enjoyed spectacular water views. We listened to birds, watched butterflies, spotted a beautiful heron and a large group of Canada geese. 

I stopped repeatedly to take photographs and read the interpretive signs along the way, each adding context about the Island’s history and landscape. 

For those who want to experience even more of PEI along the Trail, the Island Walk provides a 700-plus-kilometre route around the island, each with its own itinerary including suggestions for lodging, tour operators, local dining and more. The Island Walk Guide, written by founder and author Bryson Guptill, maps the route, which incorporates substantial portions of the Confederation Trail along with quiet roads and other Island landscapes. The 32-section route is designed to be walked or cycled in daily distances of roughly 20 to 25 kilometres. 

The Island Walk’s app adds another layer of digital storytelling and navigation, with QR codes at specific trail markers unlocking historical stories, folklore and more. 

Familiar faces on our route 

As St. Peter’s appeared and the end of our trail section came into view, I saw a familiar face biking toward me: my friend Gisele LeBlanc, and her husband, Bob Skillen, from our hometown of Fredericton, New Brunswick, followed by their friends Bill and Debbie Duke, visiting from Knowlton, Quebec. 

Gisele was celebrating her 70th birthday with a PEI road trip. She and Bob try to tackle new sections of the Confederation Trail each year. Over the years, they’ve cycled from Elmira to Souris, Mount Stewart to Georgetown, Tignish to Alberton and along the National Park near Cavendish. Their next section will be Murray Harbour. 

Later, Gisele messaged me about their St. Peter’s to Morell ride. They encountered a fox, three blue herons, several bald eagles and plenty of shorebirds. Along the way, they met visitors from all three Prairie Provinces, Quebec, Ontario and several American states. Then they stopped for a lobster roll and ice cream. 

That’s the trail experience Gisele and Bob have come to appreciate: an active way to explore PEI while enjoying nature, local food, beaches, golf and live entertainment. They also appreciate that the trail is well marked, smooth and well maintained, and that locals are friendly and helpful. After I told them about the Island Walk app, they planned to investigate it and register their completed sections. 

Photo credit: Coreen Hildebrand / maritimesmaven

Bill and Debbie have been coming to PEI since 2022, when Covid led them to stay in Canada and explore their own backyard. They accidentally landed on Cable Head above St. Peter’s and kept returning because they fell in love with its quiet beaches, dunes and laid-back St. Peter’s Landing. 

In 2025, they began bringing their bikes, exploring the trail as well as the back roads and red dirt lanes around Cable Head and Greenwich. 

For Bill, the St. Peter’s to Morell section stands out for its views across St. Peter’s Bay, the village and church steeples, mussel socks and abundant birdlife. He and Debbie found the three bridges over the Midgell, Marie and Morell rivers easy to navigate and enjoyed watching the tide move beneath them. 

They stopped in Morell for lunch, then returned to St. Peter’s, where Bill often spends time writing his novel at the Black & White Coffee Shop. It’s one more example of how the trail connects people not only to the landscape, but to the communities along it. 

You never know who you’re going to meet on the Confederation Trail, or what you might learn from them. 

Eric and I set out expecting beautiful scenery and an enjoyable bike ride. We got that. But we also found shared family histories, fellow travellers who return year after year, a young man determined to change his life, and a reminder to pay attention to the people around us. 

Maybe that’s the real gift of travelling slowly. 

You have time to see the landscape. 

And you have time to see the people in it. 

Photo credit: Coreen Hildebrand / maritimesmaven

Coreen Hildebrand is a travel writer, photographer, and content creator best known as the voice behind @maritimesmaven. Based in Fredericton, New Brunswick, she has a compass set for East Coast wonders and Bucket-List adventures. With undiminished curiosity and a storyteller’s lens, she captures the heart of home and away, through stories that celebrate connection, place, and perspective. 

Explore Prince Edward Island on our interactive map. 

The Trail Destination Framework 

Trans Canada Trail’s Trail Destination Development Framework supports trail tourism initiatives in communities across Canada, helping position trails as a driver of visitor experiences, community vitality and economic development.

Learn more about how the Trans Canada Trail supports community-led trail projects through the Trail Catalyst Fund.

Main photo credit: Coreen Hildebrand / maritimesmaven