Walking to Parkdale

After supper this evening we found ourselves in need of three things: numbing cream (to assist with a blood test Oliver is having in the morning), a toilet flap, and exercise.

As the nearest source of toilet flaps was Home Hardware on St. Peters Road, we decided to combine all three missions into an epic walk, stopping at Parkdale Pharmacy along the way for the numbing cream.

It was a beautiful, bright, warm night for a walk. Almost all of the ice and snow are gone from the streets, and the ground is almost dry.

We walked down Richmond Street to Cumberland, along the short Routes for Nature and Health diversion in back of Maritime Electric, along the Confederation Trail to Kensington Road, past the Civic Center (where the Islanders are playing tonight) to Linden Drive, and down Linden to Parkdale Pharmacy.

The numbing cream at Parkdale Pharmacy turned out to be considerably cheaper than at Shoppers Drug Mart, so by this point the trip had already paid for itself.

From Parkdale Pharmacy we walked straight out St. Peters Road to Home Hardware. After some consultations with a helpful clerk about the complicated world of toilet flaps, we acquired what, in his estimate, was the most likely candidate.

We walked out of the back of the Home Hardware parking lot to MacKay Drive, a street I’m pretty sure I’d never been on before.

At the top of MacKay Drive we encountered a prominent Charlottetown lawyer who marveled that anyone from downtown had walked so far out into the suburbs. He also told us something of the futuristic bubble house down the street that we’d encountered on our way up the hill.

We cut down Vic Campbell Boulevard to avoid getting trapped in a Möbious loop of deepest Parkdale, turned right on Palmers Lane, dashed across Mount Edward Road, and made our way onto the Experimental Farm.

On top of the rise we found ourselves in the middle of Premiers Grove, filled with trees planted to memorialize Island premiers. We found the Robert Ghiz tree, the Keith Milligan tree, the Catherine Callbeck tree, and the Wade Maclauchlan tree.

We made our way through the Grove, around past the Lily Pond, and back down to the Confederation Trail.

We ducked through the Farm Centre Legacy Garden, past the bee huts, and out the other side by Upstreet Brewing.

We crossed Allen Street to Walthen Drive, walked down Walthen to Prince Street School, cut through the playground to Upper Prince Street, and walked down Prince Street to home.

The walk took us 90 minutes from start to finish, covered 6.44 kilometers and 7,709 steps.

We fully expect that for generations to come the residents of MacKay Drive will speak of the time those two fellows walked all the way out from town on a bright spring evening.