Basin Head's sand squeaks when you walk it. A tidal channel locals call the run cuts the white beach in two, and silica in those grains is why people call them the singing sands. The fisheries museum is on site, the hour you spend out of the sun after a swim.
Basin Head Provincial Park is day use only, and the lot there is not an overnight. The night is Red Point Provincial Park, near Souris, on a supervised swim beach of its own, and Basin Head is the day from that loop. The Magdalen Islands ferry terminal is nearby.
The campground has 2-way and 3-way hookup sites and no-service pads, and it stays open into early October, as of September 2026. Book the pad before the van. These loops book ahead.
Hookup sites fill through the school-holiday weeks, and May and late September are easier. A no-service pad is a different night from a hookup site, so you match the vehicle to the site you reserved. If you need more sleeping space than a campervan, look at RVs for rent on Prince Edward Island.
Panmure Island Provincial Park is the second east-end night, the one you add for the causeway. The campground has water on both sides and a lifeguarded swim. The sites are 30-amp electric and no-service pads, and the season runs into late September.
The lighthouse beside the campground is the climb. It is an octagonal, tapered wooden tower, and you reach the lantern room by ladder-stairs. Tourism PEI calls it PEI's oldest wooden lighthouse, with a museum and gift shop open in season.
The Wood Islands ferry to Nova Scotia lands on this same east end, the Points East Coastal Drive side of the island.
Cabot Beach at Malpeque and North Cape
Malpeque Bay is a supervised swim on the west end, and Cabot Beach Provincial Park is the campground on that shore. PEI Parks calls it the largest park in western PEI. You stay on 2-way, 3-way, or no-service sites that remain open into early October. Summerside is the service town for this side of the island, and Tignish is the other name on the drive toward the cape.
North Cape is a day on the North Cape Coastal Drive, not an overnight. Wind turbines stand over the reef where the Gulf of St. Lawrence meets the Northumberland Strait, a meeting Tourism PEI describes as the longest natural rock reef in North America. The Wind Energy Interpretive Centre is the indoor hour at the cape.
The Confederation Bridge to New Brunswick is the land crossing onto this west side. Borden-Carleton is the PEI end of that crossing.
Lord Selkirk Campground at Eldon
Lord Selkirk Campground in Eldon looks over the Northumberland Strait from the Belfast shore. It is community-run, with a pool and mini-golf, and the 9-hole Belfast Highland Greens course runs beside the sites. Hookups run 2-way and 3-way at 30 amp and 50 amp, and the season follows a mid-May through mid-October shape.
The campground says its beach is not suitable for swimming. The Highland Games weekend is the one to book around, because the games fill the campground.
National park nights at Cavendish and Stanhope belong on a Charlottetown trip.