Travelling to Charlottetown PEI and looking for a place to stay?  Check out this cute Airbnb in an awesome location that makes for the right base to travel the province!

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When looking for a place to stay for my mid September 2-week trip to Prince Edward Island, I was surprised to see that A LOT of places were no longer available for my selected dates. While there were still several different options, the ones that were in my price range were few and far in between.

After getting a little frustrated with my search, I widened my search area and ended up finding a cute place in New Brunswick where we decided to spend our first 5 nights. Moncton is just a short(ish) trip over the Confederation bridge, and the price was too good to pass up.

I still needed a place for the rest of the trip though and I was pretty happy when I came across this small top floor Airbnb apartment. The price was better than a lot of listings I’d found and it appeared to be in a pretty good location, so after a short time deliberating, I snatched it up before anyone else could.

 

The Airbnb

This Airbnb is in a really good location. Although it isn’t considered to be in Charlottetown, it is only about a 12 minute drive into the city. The space is the perfect size for two people.

Upon climbing the steps around the back of the house, the front door opens up into the kitchen/dining area. There’s an open closet to the left of the door for jackets, bags, etc. to be hung. Walking through you have the living room with the washer and dryer just off to the side. The living area has a love seat with a side table on either side, a tv that’s hooked up to a sound system as well as an ottoman.

Around the corner from the living room are built-in shelves holding extra towels, toilet paper, a blow dryer and a laundry basket underneath.

Beside that is the bedroom featuring a double bed with a stand on either side. Across from the bed are more built-in shelves holding an iron and extra linens and blankets and a short closet rack.

Across from the bedroom is the small washroom area. And when I say small, I mean tiny.

Our stay

From the beginning, communication between myself and the host was excellent. Renée responded to messages promptly and I received check-in instructions with all the necessary information needed to make check-in go smoothly.

We arrived in the evening as we were driving in from New Brunswick. There are no outside lights around the back so we used our cell phone flashlights to guide our way which wasn’t so bad. Following the step by step instructions got us parked in our designated spot, around the back and up the steepish steps and into the warmth of the apartment without a hitch.

The Apartment

The space was exactly as advertised. There was a guest book on the table which offered up things to do, places to eat, closest grocery stores that were categorized by pricing with short descriptors as well which was nice and informative. There was also a handy guide on recycling, garbage and composting as the whole city is required to do this.

I will say I had some reservations about how the bed looked. I was worried that our week long stay would result in some sleepless nights as the bed was a little harder than I’m used to but boy was I wrong. We had really great sleeps every night (except one, keep reading to learn why), the sheets were soft and the covers were warm. 

The closet rack in the bedroom was located behind the door and was pretty low to the ground, due to the shape of the roof. I hung a few clothing items so I wouldn’t have to dig through the suitcase everyday and as there was nowhere to hang our towels in the bathroom, this bar served for that as well.

Overall, our stay here was really nice, it was easy to come and go. We utilized the kitchen a lot as we cooked most of our meals and the whole space had a nice functionality to it. 

The bathroom situation

The only issue I had with the entire stay was the washroom, more specifically the bathtub situation. I’m 5’2 and Yann’s 5’9 and showering was very difficult for the both of us. There’s no shower curtain and the bathtub is located just under the slanted ceiling making it impossible to stand up straight, even for me.  We had to get creative standing and squatting in awkward positions trying not to spew water everywhere which made the shower experience less than ideal.

I did read reviews before booking and no one had said the shower situation was bad, so I didn’t think much of it. However having experienced it now for myself, I’m wondering why no one did bother mention it. I’m pretty lax when it comes to A LOT when traveling, but even for me, who is pretty short, taking daily showers for a week straight in this bathtub was not fun.

If it’s a night or two, maybe 3, okay…having this space for the price we got it would make it worth it. But any longer than that, things get tired real fast…especially when the towels you used to cover the floor don’t even dry for tomorrow’s shower 🥴

The washroom is really small, which is okay, the problem is there was just nowhere to hang the towels to dry, nowhere to store anything, we had to hang our towels in the bedroom and place our toiletries on the ledge between the toilet and tub as well as the shelf just outside the bathroom. We hung the bathmat on the edge of the tub to dry(which it never really did) and the extra towel we used for the floor, we draped over the kitchen chair (it never fully dried either womp).

We survived Hurricane Fiona 

We unfortunately got caught in Hurricane Fiona during our stay at Renée’s. Thankfully it was toward the end of our stay, it started Friday night and we were checking out Sunday morning. It was terrifying to say the least. I’m happy to say the house stayed standing tall but it swayed and shook like an unbalanced washing machine on the spin cycle all throughout the night.

Before the hurricane was set to arrive, Renée  sent us a message to reassure us that things would be okay and hurricane weather was typical this time of year. While it turned out to be a lot worse than she (and everyone else one the island) had expected, we as well as the house were okay. Some massive trees came down, the power went out, there was no water or heat (thank the Lord we bought that big pack of water bottles at Costco and there were those extra blankets) but most importantly no one was hurt.

Renée was as helpful and as communicative as she could be, but with the power out, there was no internet nor could we make any calls. We spent Saturday layered up with hats, socks and, sweaters on and I fell in and out of sleep on the couch as sleep barely happened that night during the height of the storm.  The following day, Renée’s mother came and checked in with us, giving us updates as we hadn’t had any way of getting any until this point. Even after us checking out and heading to our next stay, Renée continued to see if we needed more assistance, even offering for us to stay with her parents as the majority of the island was without power and they had an extra space, food, and blankets.

The Price

For a full 7 night stay, we paid a whopping $706.19 CAD after taxes and fees. While it still hurt to pay this amount as it was only covering one week out of our 2-week stay, it really was the best bang for our buck and so much more affordable than anything else we’d seen.

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In conclusion, I would actually stay here again. Our stay was pretty good, despite the tiny slanted bathroom situation. The location was honestly perfect, the size was great for the two of us, and we really had everything we needed.

I would honestly probably only stay for a few nights though and never again past August…maybe even July to avoid the hurricane season. 

Pros and Cons

Pros:

~Great and central location

~Good price for the week

~Full apartment layout with separate living, dinning, cooking, and sleeping spaces

~Extra linens and blankets (They were definitely needed!)

~Good communication with the host

~Fully stocked kitchen with all the appliances you need to cook.

~Lovely view of the farm next door just outside the window

~Designated parking space

Cons:

~The bathtub situation 😖 :

The water pressure was pretty low, we couldn’t stand to shower, there was no shower curtain, so water got everywhere, and the fixture could also use some updating

~Not a huge con as we really didn’t mind but walking up and down the steep stairs daily might be a con for most people.