Prince Edward Island National Park

Listen first. Wind moves through the long grass on the dunes with a dry, steady hiss. Below it, the surf breaks and pulls back across the sand. Look down at your feet. The sand here is pale and soft, but a few steps away the earth turns a deep rust red. That colour runs through this whole island. Welcome to Prince Edward Island National Park, a thin coastal strip on the north shore where land, sand, and sea meet.

The park follows the island's northern coast along the Gulf of Saint Lawrence, the wide arm of the Atlantic that separates this island from mainland Quebec. It is not one large block of land. Instead, it is a chain of beaches, dunes, wetlands, and woods. Canada created the park in 1937, during the years when the country began to protect its coastlines as well as its mountains. For many Canadians, this shore is the classic image of a summer by the sea.

So why is the soil red? The answer is iron. The island rests on soft sandstone, and the iron in that rock oxidises — it rusts, in simple terms — when it meets air and water. The result is the brick and copper colour you see on the cliffs, in the fields, and on the dirt roads nearby. When the waves carry this sediment, the shallow water near the shore can turn pink or orange. It is one of the most surprising details for first-time visitors.

Those cliffs are soft, and they are always changing. Each winter storm and each high tide wears them back a little. Rock falls, sand shifts, and the shoreline moves. This means the coast you see today will not look quite the same in a few years. Keep a respectful distance from the cliff edges. The ground near the top can be undercut and weak, even when it looks solid from above.

Now turn toward the dunes. These hills of sand are held in place by marram grass, a tough plant with deep roots that grows upward as the sand piles around it. Without it, the wind would scatter the dunes inland. That is why the park asks every visitor to stay on the boardwalks and marked paths. A single shortcut, repeated by thousands of feet, can break the grass and open a gap that the wind then widens.

The park has three main sections. Cavendish, in the west, has long beaches and red cliffs. Brackley and Dalvay, in the centre, combine wide sand beaches with ponds and forest. Greenwich, in the east, was added to the park in the late 1990s. Each area has a different character, so it is worth seeing more than one if you have the time. The coastal roads between them pass farms, small harbours, and lupin-lined ditches in early summer.

At Greenwich, you will find one of the rarest landscapes in the park. The dunes there are parabolic — that means they curve into a U shape as the wind pushes their centre forward while plants anchor their edges. Slowly, over many years, these dunes move inland and bury the forest in their path. A floating boardwalk crosses a pond and leads you toward them. It is a quiet walk, with birdsong, still water, and then a sudden wall of pale sand.

Greenwich also holds a deeper human story. Archaeologists have found evidence there of Indigenous people living on this coast for thousands of years. The Mi'kmaq, the Indigenous people of this region, call the island Epekwitk, often translated as something like 'cradled on the waves.' Long before the beaches became holiday places, this shore gave people fish, shellfish, and shelter. The park today works with Mi'kmaq communities to share that history with visitors.

In the Cavendish area, the story turns to literature. The writer Lucy Maud Montgomery grew up near here, and her 1908 novel, Anne of Green Gables, drew on the farms, lanes, and woods of this district. Inside the park, Green Gables Heritage Place preserves the green and white farmhouse connected to the book, along with walking trails that Montgomery's readers know as the Haunted Wood and Lover's Lane. Visitors come from all over the world, and many arrive from Japan, where the novel has long been loved.

Near Brackley and Dalvay stands a large summer house called Dalvay-by-the-Sea. It was built in the late nineteenth century as a seaside retreat for a wealthy American oil executive. Its timber and stone design, with wide porches and gables, belongs to a style called Queen Anne Revival — a playful, asymmetrical look popular in that era. Today the house operates as a hotel inside the park. Even if you are not staying, its setting beside a calm lake gives a sense of how the rich once spent their summers here.

This coast also matters for wildlife. The piping plover, a small, sand-coloured shorebird, nests directly on the open beach. It is endangered in Canada, and its eggs are almost invisible against the sand. During nesting season, parts of some beaches are fenced or closed to protect them. Look out for the signs, and keep dogs on a leash. Out over the water, you may also see gannets diving, terns hovering, or a great blue heron standing still in a shallow pond.

The park has faced hard years, too. In 2022, a powerful storm called Fiona struck the island and caused heavy damage along this coast. It flattened trees, cut into dunes, and changed parts of the shoreline. Recovery work has continued since then, and you may still notice open patches where forest once stood, or new paths and boardwalks. These marks are a reminder that this is a living coast. The sea shapes it, and people are only visitors here.

Before you leave, stand still for a moment. Feel the wind on your face and notice the smell of salt and warm grass. Watch the line where the red earth meets the pale sand, and the pale sand meets the blue water. That simple band of colours is the heart of this place. As you walk back along the boardwalk, listen again for the hiss of the marram grass... it is the sound of the dunes holding their ground, one more day.