Changing Locations
When we were living in Thailand (we landed in 2009 and left
in 2023), we vowed that we would never return to Canada because neither of us
wanted to live through another winter.
Then things changed. We got older, our friends and family
members got older, Covid struck, the Russians invaded Ukraine, politics
remained unsettled, and tourists started driving us crazy. We made a quick
decision to move back to Canada, and found ourselves living in Calgary in April
2023.
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| We lived nice and close to the Rocky Mountains. |
Everything worked out well. We were closer to family and friends, we found that we were able to afford living in Canada (something that we weren’t actually confident about), and our first winter was very pleasant. But … the summers!
The summer of 2023 was alarmingly smoky, even in our
neighbourhood, which wasn’t anywhere near any forests. We coped, but we hoped
that it would prove to be an unusual event, not to be repeated.
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| A smoky day in Calgary. |
The summer of 2024 started off badly. When a forest fire burned Jasper, we began to wonder what the future would hold. The air in Calgary wasn’t healthy, in fact on some days it was alarmingly unhealthy. On one particularly bad day, we decided that we would move to Prince Edward Island where the sea breeze helps keep the air fresh, and the likelihood of a major forest fire is slim.
So here we are, since September of 2024, living on Canada’s
beautiful green gem of an island-province.
Star Gazing
When we left Alberta, we had a month to kill before we could
move into the apartment we were renting. For much of that time, we stayed in a
hotel out in the country, not too far from the sea. At night time, the star
gazing was amazing. The Milky Way looked incredibly, um, milky, and we enjoyed
spotting satellites, space stations, and shooting starts. Once we moved into
our apartment in the city, we missed the star gazing. Even worse, we missed all
the northern lights, even after driving out to the country and waiting hours
for a non-event. We both yearned for a place away from the city lights.
So we tossed around some ideas: buy a recreational vehicle
and arrange a spot in an RV park (3-year waiting period!), buy a lot for
permanent placement of an RV (PEI laws frown on this), buy a lot for a house, or
buy a lot for a summer cottage and continue to keep the apartment year-round.
Friends and family gave us much-appreciated feedback on our ideas, and helped
us mold a workable plan.
A Whole Lot of Lot
The “buy a lot” part of the plan was cast in stone on
November 3rd when we put a down payment on a parcel of land about
halfway between Charlottetown and Cavendish. It’s a little over 1½ acres, is on
a hill, is surrounded by woods and farmland, and overlooks (though the trees)
Trout River. We became owners on November 28th. For now, we call it Lot 7.
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| Before it was mowed. |
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| We're close to Trout River. |
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| The red line indicates our property boundaries. We have two neighbours up the hill from us. |
In quick succession, we thought about an RV, then a modular home for year-round use, then a mini-home for year-round use, and then a mini-home for summer use (we count summer as anywhere from 6 to 8 months).
A Mini-Home
A mini-home is a one-piece manufactured home, built in a
factory and then moved onsite by a big truck. The one we are buying is 16 x 68
with two bedrooms and two bathrooms and a shed roof. It is called the Manhattan
and comes with a basic design but we were allowed to customize it and upgrade
some of the options. After a number of iterations with the builder, we settled
on a plan that works well for us. We have paid the deposit, so they will start
to build it soon (in their factory in New Brunswick).
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| Similar to the one we are having built. |
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| We're flipping it and changing the windows and front door. |
We will build a nice deck on the front of the Manhattan so we can watch the sunrise and then the sunset and then the Milky Way. We’ll have competitions on spotting space stations and satellites. We will once again marvel at the brightness of Jupiter and Venus, and the redness of Mars and Betelgeuse. We will once again know what phase the Moon is at. We will spend less time watching Netflix.
Yard work!
There is a lot of site preparation required for our
Manhattan. Lot 7 is on a hill, so we need to excavate a level spot. We also
need to put in a septic system, a well, and a driveway. It’s a big lot, so we
will plant ground cover that doesn’t need much maintenance. Any maintenance
that is required, we plan to hire out to a local farmer or some other
entrepreneurial neighbor. It would be brutal to have to navigate our hill with
a ride-on lawn mower.
Summer Time
Lot 7 is in the countryside. We do not want to live in the
countryside during snowy months (which can be anywhere from 5 to 7 months,
maybe less). We had considered keeping the apartment, but that would have meant
buying a whole set of furnishings for the Manhattan. Friends told us about
suites available in downtown Charlottetown, so we checked them out. We are now
on the list for a fully furnished 2-bedroom 2-bathroom unit with washer, dryer,
dishwasher, etc. We have booked December 1, 2025 – April 30, 2026 but the dates
are flexible. So, if November of 2025 looks snowy and miserable, we could move
in sooner. If April looks fabulous, we could move out sooner. It’s a superb
arrangement and we can’t believe our luck.
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