3 1/2 weeks Maine/Maritime Islands/Quebec Road trip itinerary

Hi,
YOu haven't seemed to get any replies, so I'll give it an initial go. I assume you are planning on renting a car when you get to Nova Scotia?

You have 3 or potentially 4 provinces that you could see. Yarmouth in in Nova Scotia. Digby is near there with the famous scallops. Halfax is the biggest city there and worth some time. You may also want to see Peggy's cove, Lunenberg etc.

Cape Breton is worth a couple of days at least, maybe more, it is a beautiful drive.
Next Provinces are New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island ( PEI). I think PEI is worth a few days for a quieter spot.
New Brunswick is between Nova Scotia and Quebec. You will have to look at a map to see how you want to cut drive across to Quebec as it also borders Maine. Quebec is huge, and has tons to see. Priorities for most people usually are Montreal and Quebec city. There is another thread running with advice on those two.

Greetings Lisa,

Thank you for kind reply. I stayed up all night mapping out a perfect one way itinerary from Maine/Maritime Islands/Quebec… then I called the car rental company. Just like everyone said in other posts, that just killed my itinerary. The cost to do a drop off at other location was ridiculous.

So I either have to fly into Quebec/Halifax/Portland, Maine as a round trip. Back to the drawing board.

I’d do in/out of Portland ( Also look at Manchester and Boston to see if flights are cheaper ). Instead of Camden, look at Rockland to see if hotel is less - they are only a few miles apart. I liked Rockland Harbor Hotel

Just don't ask anyone local about the "Maritime Islands". You will get the same quizzical look I had on reading your title. We live in the Maritime Provinces, or usually just the Maritimes. There are some islands, but most of Nova Scotia and almost all of New Brunswick are attached to the continent. The only large Maritime Islands are Cape Breton and Prince Edward Island.

I was just going to say the same about “Maritime Islands”.
Also, if you go to Newfoundland, Newfoundlanders will tell you that it is not in the Maritimes….it is Newfoundland.
They are very proud of their land and rightly so.

I hope you have the time to visit Prince Edward Island (PEI). It is beautiful and very relaxing. We visited in August 2023, and it was not very crowded, and the weather and temps were very pleasant. You mention visiting cities. I hope you have the time to visit the countryside and the small villages and beaches.

For PEI I recommend spending 3 or 4 nights in Rustico at the Barachois Inn. This is close to the Greenwich Dunes and the Greenwich Dunes Walking Trail that take you over sand dunes and a pond via a boardwalk. One of the highlights of our trip. Eat lobster at the New Glasgow Lobster Suppers. Explore PEI National Park and the Anne of Green Gables sites if you are interested in that. We had our best lobster rolls at Richards Seafood Shack.

We have visited Maine several times, Nova Scotia once. Because of the difficulty / impossibility of inter-country car rentals, you probably need to divide your trip into a couple of different segments. Part one is rental car pick-up in Portland, drop in Bar Harbor. If you haven't already purchased the plane tickets, it might be simpler or cheaper to fly into Boston instead which is only 100 miles from Portland. Part two is rental car in Yarmouth (it appears Enterprise is the only option) and drop it when you are done with Nova Scotia and PEI back in Halifax. Fly to Montreal and rent a car there for the Quebec portion.

In Nova Scotia we enjoyed Lunenburg, the drive between Wolfeville and Annapolis Royale, a day in Halifax, and several days on Cape Breton Island which was the most interesting part. In Maine, besides Bar Harbor / Acadia N.P. , we also enjoyed exploring the little towns on the peninsula where Blue Hill is located.

All of our trips in that area were early October for fall color.