During a road trip through Canada, we visited Prince Edward Island specifically because I loved reading the Anne of Green Gables books! It’s a beautiful island that is worth exploring even if you’re not an Anne fan, but if you are, these are the top Anne of Green Gables locations you need to check out when you visit!
Top 7 Anne of Green Gables locations on PEI
Can you visit PEI without visiting Anne of Green Gables locations? You definitely shouldn’t because it’s one of the top things to do on PEI! And if you’re an Anne of Green Gables fangirl like I am, you’ll really love it. But there are lots of other things you can do on PEI if you want to experience more of the island (which I recommend, of course), and I have a have a blog post on the top things to do on PEI just for you.
Anne of Green Gables Museum
There are a few different places you can visit for the Anne experience, and the Anne of Green Gables Museum was probably my favorite. It’s at the home of L.M. Montgomery’s aunt and uncle, where Montgomery lived for a time and where she was married. And the land that it’s on is just beautiful!
It looks like it hasn’t changed since the 1800s, and you can see artifacts from Montgomery’s life, like the organ that was played at her wedding, and artifacts that she wrote about in her books, including Anne’s Enchanted Bookcase, the Crazy Patchwork Quilt, and the Blue Chest from The Story Girl.
This is the spot where Montgomery got married, and the guide said that they actually do still have weddings here today! So if you’re a huge Anne of Green Gables fan, you could have your wedding at the museum 🙂
The property that the house is on is absolutely beautiful! There are rolling hills, barns, and horses, and you can even go for a carriage ride. They also have a great gift shop with Anne of Green Gables gifts but also some cool locally made items, and I definitely gave them a lot of business 🙂
This is also where you can see the real Lake of Shining Waters that inspired Montgomery (and the carriage ride goes around it). If you look up the Lake of Shining Waters on PEI, you’ll see a different lake that was named after Montgomery’s Lake of Shining Waters so it isn’t the original. My husband went to check it out and there is an admission fee and it’s not as scenic as the one at the museum. So I just recommend seeing the real Lake of Shining Waters at the museum!
Green Gables Heritage Place
The Green Gables Heritage Place is the location that inspired the location of Green Gables. It was the house of Montgomery’s relatives, and while she never lived there, she visited frequently and it inspired a lot of the Anne of Green Gables locations that she wrote about. Lover’s Lane and the Haunted Wood are also on this property, and you can explore them!
Probably because this is the “real” Green Gables, it was a lot busier than the Museum was and there were a lot of people in and around the house. So just plan accordingly if you want any photos of Green Gables without people walking in front!
The Heritage Place also has a museum about Montgomery’s life on PEI, and it was helpful to see a timeline of everything after visiting the Museum. It also had a pretty big gift shop, so I recommend checking that out on your way out 😉
After you tour the house, you can walk through the Haunted Wood and Lover’s Lane! It was a beautiful (and shaded, thank goodness) walk, and while the house was really busy, the path was pretty quiet.
L.M. Montgomery’s birthplace
Montgomery’s birthplace wasn’t open when I stopped by, but you can tour it! Some things in the home are replicas, but there are a lot of artifacts from her life and her family that you can see.
Explore Avonlea Village
The town of Cavendish was where Montgomery lived and inspired the locations in Anne of Green Gables, but she named it Avonlea in the books. So Avonlea Village was named for Anne of Green Gables, and it’s a little village with historic buildings (including the school that Montgomery taught in) that have been turned into restaurants and shops. So while it’s not super authentic to Anne or Montgomery, it’s a cute place to walk around, and I recommend getting some chocolates and ice cream while you’re there! We also got raspberry cordial slushies from the chocolate shop, which were delicious 🙂
Other Places to Experience Anne of Green Gables
Two places I didn’t make it to are Montgomery’s grave site and Anne of Green Gables: The Musical. The musical is a huge production at the Confederation Centre of the Arts in Charlottetown, and I think we just missed it by a day or two! It’s been put on annually for decades, and they’re actually changing it to biannually after 2024. So if you want to see it, make sure you plan your trip accordingly and get tickets well in advance!
Explore Charlottetown
So now for some things that are more indirectly tied to Anne of Green Gables but were mentioned in the books! Charlottetown is the capital of Prince Edward Island, and it’s such a beautiful historic city and mentioned a few times in Anne of Green Gables. And Montgomery did attend the Prince of Wales College in Charlottetown, which you can check out. We did a little driving tour around the historic areas to see everything.
I couldn’t get over all the pretty houses everywhere! We spent an afternoon driving and walking around Charlottetown, and there’s a lot you can see there. My favorite spot was Victoria Park with the beautiful views of the water, so I definitely recommend visiting there if the weather is nice.
St. Dunstan’s Basilica
Drive around the countryside
One of the reasons I wanted to visit PEI is because the scenery sounds so picturesque in the Anne of Green Gables books. And it really does live up to the hype! I loved just driving around PEI and seeing the historic farms and rolling hills and quaint, colorful houses. You can really get an idea of how Montgomery was inspired to create such romantic names for everything in the books.
And we went in June when lupins were blooming everywhere and I was OBSESSED! (I even planted lupins in my garden this year because I loved them so much!)
There are a few scenic overlooks that you can pull over at to get some photos of the beautiful views!
So those are the top Anne of Green Gables locations I recommend seeing! We did all of this within two days, so it can definitely be done in a short trip (but I would have loved to have stayed longer). And if you’re really short on time, Charlottetown is the only thing that isn’t really close to the rest of the Anne of Green Gables locations, so you could skip that and do everything else within a day. If you have been to PEI, which spot was your favorite? 🙂
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