A Weekend in Prince Edward County

Last weekend we went on a last minute weekend trip to Prince Edward County, a beautiful island community about two hours east of Toronto. It was a wonderful chance to explore more of our native province together as a family. We've learned that choosing the right activities for our family of three must allow for lots of exploration, flexibility and a slower pace than from our newlywed adventuring days. Even though our stay was short, we found the relaxed, scenic lifestyle of PEC made for the perfect leisurely, refreshing weekend.

This trip was made possible through Ford Canada and #FamilyFlexTime. But before I dive into our experience with the Ford Flex Limited, I feel it's necessary to introduce you to our own family car. A silver 2000 Toyota Corolla. We bought it for a measly 1500 bucks through our mechanic three years ago, with over 350,000 km behind it. Some of its key features include manual windows and locks, a broken air conditioner, a sticky ignition, a wonky turn signal (it takes a few tries), an overactive heater, and a shabby CD stereo with missing buttons. It's only saving grace is the great gas mileage, and getting us from point A to point B without fail.

Our experience with the Ford Flex Limited felt as if the Jetson's had loaned the Flintstones their car for the weekend. From our glorified wagon, the Flex was like a funny, foreign, futuristic contraption. It turned on effortlessly with a push of a button, offered a Reverse Sensing System (rear park assist) and voice-activated navigation, synced automatically with our iPods (very important to the husband), and blew out COLD air (what is this sorcery?). It was so spacious that we felt a bit selfish for not inviting our entire family to join us. Ramona was endlessly amused by the sunroof(s) (there are four) (oh, and they're called Multi-Panel Vista Roofs, ain't that fancy?), as well as the touch-screen controls (part of the SYNC 3 system) from when we made a pit-stop and let her explore the front of the car.

The list goes on and on of the things the Flex had and did, and I'm sure we didn't even take advantage of half of them. We're confident when we say that the future is friendly with the Ford Flex Limited. I mean, coming from our prehistoric push car, we're pretty easy to please - we were more than sold on just the cold air part.

Anyway, here are some photos and details about our visit to Prince Edward County. Enjoy!

LAVENDER FARM

We wish we had been able to go to the Prince Edward County Lavender farm just a week or two early - by the time we arrived most of the lavender had been cut or was beginning to dry out unfortunately. But it was still beautiful to see (and smell!), and to watch the honey bees buzzing about happily. There was also a little shop that sold all things lavender inside.




I had no idea how many varieties of lavender existed - not just purple in colour either, but ranging from grey to pink to blue.


Ramona's first taste of soda - lavender soda!

BLUEBERRY PICKING

Between the beach (pictures below) and blueberry picking, I'm not sure which was the bigger highlight of our trip for Ramona. We went to Little Highbush Blueberry Farm in Waupoos. It was definitely my favourite part of our weekend - seeing my baby surrounded by her favourite food, helping to pick (and taste) berries, carrying her little basket around.

















SANDBANKS PROVINCIAL PARK

The Toronto area has many things - great beaches aren't one of them. You have to go a little out of your way (Wasaga, Grand Bend) to find worthwhile shores. And while I secretly hate sand, and how it finds it's way into luggage and clothes and hair (and up your infant's nose) - if I had to spend the day at any beach, I would choose Sandbanks again and again, despite that two and a half hour drive. The sand is soft, the water is warm and shallow, and the dunes make a breathtaking landscape. Ramona could have easily spent our entire trip there, just digging and rolling around on the shore, and even worked up the courage since our last visit to a beach to go into the water.









Fin. xx