Tuesday, we met at the University of Moncton, where we met Lisa Roy, a wonderful vocal teacher. Lisa worked with us and taught us some good imagery and sound concepts. Was great to get a good vocal warm up and reinforce tone concepts so early in the tour. She also helped us to woodshed all the words for Partons la Mer est Belle, which we have to have memorized!
At 10:30am we got on a beautiful coach bus, driven by Mario, who was one of the parent chaperones who came out to Vancouver, and is hosting 3 of our boys. Mario gave us an epic day: we headed over the Confederation Bridge to PEI. The bridge is 12 km long! A feat of engineering for sure. We stopped on the other side and took some beautiful photos with the bridge in the background. From there, we set our sites on Cavendish. Now in my little mind, I thought “Green Gables” and Cavendish was “just on the other side of the bridge”. However, it is actually on the other side of PEI- about 2.5 hours drive through beautiful rolling green hills and more quaint homes, spread out over the green acreage. Kids slept a lot 0n the way there. Jet lag and has hit hard! Knowing that this was “Anne of Green Gables Day”, during the bus ride, singers started braiding their hair in the style of Anne. Very fun.
When we arrived at Cavendish, we learned about the inspiration for L.M. Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables books. And right there, on the grassy slope with the Green Gables home in the background, and “Anne” joining us, we sang Ice Cream from the Anne of Green Gables musical. Totally the stuff that these tour experiences are made of: creating memorable moments by singing together, connecting to places of historical significance.
We had some quality time to explore the grounds, eat ice cream and raspberry cordial, and just enjoy the scenes and home that has been created from the journals and writing of L.M. Montgomery.
Our JCA hosts were terrific guides, telling us all kinds of interesting information. Such fun people.
From there, we went to the famous Cavendish beach. Like all of PEI the sand is RED and fine fine fine, like rusty red powder. This was right out on the Atlantic. The next stop across the water would have been Newfoundland. We could see the ominous grey clouds rolling in, and no sooner than we got our toes in the water, than the thunder started and the life guards cleared the beach for safety! We ran to the bus to try to beat the torrential rain that was on its way.
Another long bus ride back to Charlottetown. During the pounding rain, singers started singing our repertoire and teaching each other songs- it was one of those wonderful spontaneous things that choir singers do.
Dinner at East Side Marios, then on the the theatre for the musical, Anne of Green Gables.
Okay. If you haven’t seen it, you must. The singing was excellent, the acting brilliant, the dancing… AMAZING!!! It was a total blast to look down our rows of seats and to see our singers all lit up- their faces glowing with delight. When Ice Cream was sung by the cast, we all almost leapt out of our seats!
By the time the show was over and we were back on the bus, it was 10:30pm and we had a 2 hour+ bus ride ahead of us. Our friend Mario drove us safely home, while everyone slept on the bus.
An epic, memorable, wonderful day.