Bird Island, Malpeque Bay, PEI

Bird Island with the Malpeque sandhills in the background

Bird Island is in Malpeque Bay, just to the east of Lennox Island and belongs to the Island Nature Trust (INT). Most of my PEI summers in the last 20 years have included a visit to Bird Island. This summer, on a beautiful August day, I paddled my Merganser kayak from Gillis Point and did a circumnavigation of Bird Island (10 km or so).

Day track was 10.4 km

Bird Island, GE view

My first stop was on the south shore for a walk, and I shot a few pics of the many erratic rocks along the shoreline.  From there, I paddled around to the east side of the island and took a tour inside the small lagoon.  It was pretty quiet today – no birds or ducks to be seen. This place is busier during the bird migration times (spring and fall).  My next stop was on the north side of the island for a break and a snack. On the north side, I did notice some poison ivy on the sandy shore bank.  Also, there were some ducks in the island’s larger pond (Duck Pond).  My next/last shore stop was at the SW corner of the island. From there, it’s a nice walk on the gravelled crescent west shoreline of the island with Lennox Island in sight. 

Then, it was the paddled across the channel back to Gillis Point and my car. Even though it’s only a 1.5 km crossing, this can sometimes be a tricky paddle depending on wind, chop, and current conditions. Today, the crossing back to the mainland was easy in reasonably calm waters. Paddling around Bird Island is always great, and it was a good test of my recent shoulder injury. The shoulder has come a long way since June -- I had to be careful, but 10 km of paddling was no problem. 

One of the many erratics

Another PEI island with Poison Ivy

Bird Island's shore

Heading back towards Gillis Point