On the road to Canada and back

Young Chang

As they were headed toward Prince Edward Island in Canada, Scottia

Evans read aloud “Anne of Green Gables” while her husband, Paul,

drove the motor-home.

When they neared Nova Scotia, they read Henry Wadsworth

Longfellow’s “Evangeline.”

Approaching Maine, they read Richard Russo’s “Empire Falls.”

“In the motor-home, for some reason, I’m able to read out loud

without getting sick,” Scottia Evans said. “We read seven or eight

books out loud. Paul said, ‘instead of books on tape, I got books on

Scottia.’”

The Newport Beach couple made a “big triangle,” as Scottia Evans

put it, during their eight-week trip. Their three corners were

Newfoundland, Vancouver Island and then back to Newport Beach. Stops

in between included many cities in Canada, New York, Montana and

Wyoming.

“He did 99% of the driving,” Scottia Evans said. “I did the

reading and I’m the one who got the Diet Cokes and snacks.”

Paul Evans calls the couple’s 32-foot-long motor home “The Gray

Ghost.” It’s gray and has a bedroom, a sofa, a shower, a tub, a

four-burner stove, an oven, a refrigerator and two TVs.

“I’m embarrassed to say,” Scottia Evans said about the two TVs.

“[The motor home] has everything a person needs to be happy.”

The travelers visited friends who lived along their vacation

route, which kept them on the road from late June to mid-August. They

rode their bikes in Canada. They drove when they wanted to and slept

when they wanted.

“That’s the fabulous thing about a motor home,” said Scottia

Evans, a sixth-grade teacher at Harbor View School in Corona del Mar.

“You’re completely flexible. You never have to make reservations.”

Paul Evans said it was difficult to select a favorite city or

moment because the many picturesque bays and places they saw seemed

to top each other.

“It’s kind of like castles in Europe,” said the computer

applications teacher at Ensign Intermediate School in Newport Beach.

“You don’t get blase, but it’s one big exciting serendipity after

another.”

But Prince Edward Island, he said, was the “biggest surprise” and

the perfect setting for whoever would ever want to make a movie about

make believe never-never lands.

“Clean, winding roads ... it’s just storybook picturesque,” he

said.

* Have you, or someone you know, gone on an interesting vacation

recently? Tell us your adventures. Drop us a line to Travel Tales,

330 W. Bay St., Costa Mesa, CA 92627; e-mail young.chang@

latimes.com; or fax to (949) 646-4170.