Western Road Trip – I’m Back!

July 19, 2021

Hello everyone. I have been home for a few days now, and will leave again in a few days to visit Salt Spring Island and then family on Vancouver Island. I did not go across Canada, and I am a bit disappointed about that, but I had a wonderful time on the prairies!

I’m sorry, but whoever says that the prairies are boring just isn’t looking! The prairies are certainly not flat, and the roads aren’t always straight. The scenery changes almost every second as you drive along. The roads dip down and climb up and around, passing an endless variety of fields that change shape and colour, from every shade of green and gold to the bright yellow of canola and the pretty blue of flax.

There are distant hills, and wide, deeply eroded valleys that you drive down into, with sparkling braided rivers snaking through them like the gorgeous North and South Saskatchewan Rivers, the Bow, the Red Deer, and the Oldman River. There are sharply etched coulees, copses of trees, reed-lined ponds, streams, and swaths of native prairie grasses. There are colourful and weirdly sculpted badlands, great sand hills, and large freshwater reservoirs and salt lakes. And, even if you are standing still in one spot, the scenery is still always changing because of the almost-constant prairie wind that ripples through the grasses, trees, and wildflowers, and that moves the clouds to create an ever-changing sky. There are manmade structures as well to catch your eye and interest. Some are ancient like tipi rings, and stone effigies and ceremonial circles. Some are from the early days of the pioneers, faded or derelict old farm houses and barns, and tiny white churches that are often well-cared for and freshly painted. And of course there are modern farm buildings, roads, railroad tracks, grain elevators, windmills, shiny metal storage tanks, and other large structures and machinery – all sturdy, well-built, and purposeful.

And there is so much history! I visited many excellent small town museums, went on guided interpretive hikes, and toured world-class facilities like the Royal Saskatchewan Museum, Wanuskewin, and Head Smashed In Buffalo Jump. I saw dinosaur fossils, learned about the geological history of the prairies, and viewed artefacts and interpretive displays that shed light on the traditional way of life of the indigenous people who have lived on the plains for more than 11,000 years. I also learned more about the arrival and experiences of European explorers, fur traders, homesteaders, and the Northwest Mounted Police as they moved into and changed the prairie environment forever.

In future posts, I plan to feature some of the wonderful places that I visited, but for now here are a few stats about my trip overall, including a list and photos of some of the wildlife that I spotted.

Days on the Road: 30

Mileage: 4266 miles = 6865 kilometers, almost all on secondary roads and a lot of gravel too (dusty but fun!)

Gas Costs: $946 (lowest price paid, $1.269 per litre, somewhere in Alberta, highest price paid $1.599 in Vancouver before leaving)

Camping Nights: 23 (mostly in municipal, provincial, and national park campsites. 4 nights were “stealth” (and free) in hospital parking lots, a hotel parking lot, and beside a town park)

Comfort Level: excellent! I slept well, camped well, ate healthily, and felt safe throughout.

Exercise: lots of walking and some wonderful swims

Meals: 3 fast food breakfasts, one fast food lunch, and one dinner out in Regina with a glass of wine. All other meals were camp meals or on-the-go snacks.

Hotel Nights: 7 (2 in Regina, 2 in Saskatoon, 1 in Medicine Hat, and 2 in Lethbridge) All of the hotel stays were because of extreme heat warnings and also extreme thunder storm warnings, but it was definitely nice to get really clean, do laundry, have a bit more space, and cool down with the help of AC.

Annoyances: tailgaters, melting cooler ice, and energy-sapping temperatures above 30 degrees!

Massive Prairie Storms: 3 (thunder, lightning, wind, and lashes of rain, but thankfully no hail and no tornados!)

New Travel Companion: I found this little Parks Canada fellow in my campsite at Grasslands and his cheerful face kept me company while driving.

Wildlife Spotted:

Hawks: So many! Soaring and swooping over the fields, usually in the mornings. I love them!

Golden eagles: 2, both sitting regally on fence posts, very exciting!

I saw countless other wonderful birds, including American pelicans, gulls, many kinds of shore birds that nest on prairie lakes, eastern and western kingbirds, warblers, wrens, curlews, killdeer, northern flickers, gray catbirds (google “youtube catbird mewing call” to see how they got their name!), robins, magpies, crows, ravens, and swallows in the hundreds including cliff, bank, tree, barn, and violet-green swallows. Finally, one night in Grasslands, at dusk and after a beautiful sunset, I heard two great horned owls calling to each other below me in the dense trees lining a coulee – a moving and magical moment that I will never forget.

White tailed deer: probably about 20- 30, including this morning visitor to my campsite, munching away on some tasty leaves.

Mule deer: 40-60, including these two impressive fellows in a field of canola.

Pronghorn antelope: 30-50, usually in groups of 1, 2 or 3, including several mothers with babies. One wanted to impress me with his speed by zipping across the highway, scooting quickly under the barbed wire fence at the side of the road, and then zooming at top speed across a field. Wow! They are the second fastest land animals after cheetahs! I loved seeing them.

Bison: I saw several at Grasslands National Park and Waterton, and also a large herd near Head Smashed In Buffalo Jump, with many new calves. Here are a few members of that herd. They look so right in the landscape. It is astounding to me how the buffalo hunters could decimate 30 million bison to near extinction in only several decades. Thirty million! It is shocking, incredibly sad, and nearly incomprehensible!

Jackrabbits: 1 (My, what long ears you have!)

Nuttals rabbits: 6 (tiny and very very cute)

Rattlesnake: 1 (a bit too close for comfort!)

Coyotes: 4

Cross fox: 1 (This fox has caught a good-sized gopher for a midday meal! I was really happy to have seen him or her.)

Gophers (Richardson Ground Squirrels) and Black-tailed Prairie Dogs: too many to count! And so stressful when you are driving and there they are on the side of the road and you are going fast and thinking, “Please, please, please, PLEASE don’t run out in front of me at the last minute! Aaah! Dodge (safely!), oh no?, phew, thank goodness I missed him! Why do they DO that?!)

Badgers: 2 (my first!)

Porcupine: 1 (My first! A large, lumbering old fellow!)

Beavers: 2

Muskrat: 1

Moose: 1, in B.C. (Finally! I saw a moose when I was 17 in Quebec, and a mother moose and calf in Yellowstone in my 20’s, but I have never seen one in all of my B.C. travels, nor in the Yukon, nor in the Northwest Territories, and not even in Newfoundland where they are exceedingly numerous!)

Bears: none this trip, but maybe on the next adventure!

Thank you so much to everyone for reading. I hope you are all having a very happy summer.

Moon Lodge Gathering, 2020, original art by Metis artist Leah Dorion, from her exhibit at the Batoche National Historic Site.

Western Road Trip – Saskatoon Riverside Walk, and a different kind of Canada Day

July 2, 2021

After staying cool all afternoon in my Saskatoon hotel on Canada Day, I ventured out after 6 p.m. to explore a section of the Meewasin Valley trails, a 90 km network of trails and paved pathways that follows both sides of the South Saskatchewan River as it meanders its way through town. The paths pass under, and provide access to the many bridges, and they connect parks and other civic spaces.

Avoiding the freeways, I made my way by car through town to an area on the west side of the Broadway Bridge and parked near Broadway and 4th Avenue South. I walked towards the river and found myself in Kiwanis Memorial Park where a “Cancel Canada Day – Bring Them Home” event was being held to support residential school survivors and to remember the children who did not make it home.

The previous day, I had visited the grounds of the provincial Legislative Assembly Building in Regina where the Canadian and Saskatchewan flags were flying at half mast.

And on the front steps there was this moving display of children’s backpacks and toys. The organizers plan to fill the steps with 751 backpacks to represent the 751 bodies recently found in unmarked graves at the site of the former Marieval Residential Indian School in southeastern Saskatchewan.

I sat for a while at the event, listened to the powerful drumming and singing, and thought about our country – both the injustices and mistakes of the past and also the many wonderful attributes of our country as the vast majority of Canadians try to do their best for their families, neighbours, and communities. I do think that Canada is a country to be celebrated, but on this Canada Day I agreed wholeheartedly with Saskatoon Mayor Charlie Clark who said that the time is not right for festivities. He said, “We are in a time of mourning in our community and our country. It does not feel like a time for celebration. It feels like a time to reckon with the truth of residential schools and the impacts of racism and colonial relationships in our country.”

After a while, I left the park and walked on this lovely trail heading downstream towards the University Bridge.

I walked almost all the way to the University Bridge, and then returned by way of Spadina Crescent East, where many historic churches were spaced out over just a few blocks. Here is the Knox United Church, built between 1912-1914, with the congregation founded in 1885.

Almost next door was the St. Johns Cathedral (Anglican), and then I passed the St. Paul’s Roman Catholic Cathedral. There was a “We Are Sorry” sign on the door, but the apology was clearly not accepted or appreciated by some who are suffering grief and anger.

A little further on Spadina was St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church, and nearby was the Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church, all large edifices built of brick and stone and determined, it seems, to proclaim their supremacy as the “right” place to worship the Christian faith.

I left the churches behind to photograph this Saskatoon landmark- a grand old railway hotel which is now the Delta Bessborough Hotel. It was built in 1935 by the Canadian National Railway at the urging of prominent Saskatoon businessmen who wanted to outdo Regina and its railway hotel which was built by the Canadian Pacific Railway in 1926!

From here, I returned to the riverside pathway and continued walking upstream towards the beautiful Traffic Bridge.

I walked over the Traffic Bridge and stopped in the center for this view back towards the Broadway Bridge.

At the end of the Traffic Bridge was some charming crochet art, and another view towards the Broadway Bridge which included the Delta Hotel, 10 stories tall and for some three decades the tallest building in Saskatoon.

Then I crossed the road to the other side of the Traffic Bridge for these great views back towards the business end of town and several tall glass and steel towers.

I crossed back over the bridge to arrive at River Landing, an inviting place with sculptures, pavilions, and a busy spray park where families of many different ethnicities were enjoying the warm summer evening.

I rested for a while on a shaded bench and then walked further upstream and out onto the next bridge (Senator Sid Buckwold Bridge) to take in this view back towards River Landing,

and this view of the river and downstream bridges,

and then this view of people enjoying the coolness of a dip in the river from the east bank.

At this point I was feeling quite warm myself and decided to return to my car. As I arrived back at the Traffic Bridge, I saw that many of the participants of the “Cancel Canada Day – Bring Them Home” event were beginning a march over the bridge, reminding me again that this was indeed a different kind of Canada Day, but one I think that needed to be had.

May all of us live together in peace and harmony, with tolerance, respect, compassion, and understanding among our guiding principles. O Canada. Goodnight everyone.

Western Road Trip – Hiding out in Saskatoon

July 2, 2021

In the end, I decided to head straight to Saskatoon instead of trying to camp because the forecast was calling for 35 degrees on July 1st, and 39 degrees today. I would rather be camping, but decided that it was better to err on the side of caution and stay cool in an air-conditioned hotel room!

For the past two weeks I have been travelling mostly on secondary highways and gravel roads, and have often been the only one on the road except for a few local pickups and work trucks, so it was a change to drive the busy and fast freeway between Regina and Saskatoon. I was happy though as the scenery continued to delight me and I saw my first field of blue-flowered flax and several beautiful hawks soaring. I was also entertained for a time by the radio and enjoyed Jack FM’s, Sherry & Woody’s Canada Day Countdown of the “Greatest Canadian Artists of all Time” (“more Canadian than a heritage moment” said Sherry). I don’t necessarily agree with the countdown line-up, derived from listener votes on social media platforms, but it was very fun to listen to some classic Canadian tunes while zooming along in central Saskatchewan! Here is the Countdown playlist in case you’re curious!

10. April Wine – Sign of the Gypsy Queen

9. Loverboy – Everybody’s Working for the Weekend

8. Kenny Shields (Streetheart) – Under my Thumb

7. BTO – Takin’ Care of Business (very big when I was in Junior High!)

6. Alanis Morissette – You Oughta Know

5. Rush – Closer to the Heart

4. Burton Cummings (Guess Who) – American Woman

3. Neil Young (Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young) – Ohio

2. Bryan Adams – Summer of ’69

1 Tragically Hip – Courage

I made one stop on the two and a half hour journey when I saw a grouping of American Pelicans on a sand bar at the south end of Blackstrap Lake. They were preening themselves happily in the sun and I was very excited to watch them for a few moments.

Zoomed in views also revealed that gulls, crows, ducks, and a cormorant were sharing the sand bars with the pelicans.

Upon arrival in Saskatoon, I initially got a bit lost on their crazy system of freeways where multiple highways converge and split and there’s a freeway ring road with multiple names and I had to exit more than once to reorient myself!

Huh? Darn Saskatoon Freeway Signs! (Safety note – I took this photo while walking, not while driving!)

One missed exit though meant that I drove over the Gordie Howe bridge for a stunning first view of the wide, curving, sparkling, and tree-lined South Saskatchewan River. Wow! What a river! A long, roaring train, with some double-decker cars, was running parallel to me on the adjacent train bridge as I drove along, adding to the excitement. A picture was impossible of course!

Once turned around, I successfully found my way to my planned destination, Saskatoon’s Western Development Museum – Boomtown. Largely geared to the early settler experience in Saskatchewan, this was a massive museum and very well presented. The first section was an entire fictional town, circa 1910, where you walk along on wooden sidewalks in “Boomtown” peering into more than 30 various homes and business to see artefacts from the era.

Here are some interior shots of the one room school house, pharmacy, and clockworks.

At the end of Main Street there was a beautiful old locomotive engine on tracks, and a full-sized train station with someone on the platform waiting for a train! Interpretive boards explained that the railways were critical to the existence of prairie towns and villages. It brought settlers and their necessary supplies, and transported their agricultural products to distant markets. On my travels in southern Saskatchewan I saw how many small towns have been adversely affected in recent decades with the closure of rail lines.

I spent quite a bit of time reading about the Metis and I admired the artistry of the embroidery and beadwork in these Metis garments, rifle cover, and bags. In the next few days I will be travelling to historical Metis villages and to some of the battle sites of the Metis Rebellion.

There were old photographs and personal accounts accompanying many of the displays throughout the museum, and I spent a lot of time reading about the Depression and Dust Bowl years. This quote really caught my eye,

“In the pioneer days we were all like little boats tossing on the prairie ocean of dry land, taking a chance on success or failure in an unpredictable adventure.” C. Evans Sargent, 1955.

There was a huge gallery filled with early tractors and farming implements. This is just one small part of it!

And, finally, there was one more gallery filled with classic cars which I almost skipped (having already been in the museum for more than two hours, and thinking that I wasn’t all that interested). But, I am very glad that I didn’t skip it. What a great collection of gorgeous machines!

Now, it is too difficult to choose just a few favourites to show you, and I know several people who would love to see them all, so please just scroll through to the end if you’re not that into cars!

I was 14 years old when this baby made its debut!

Yellow: Minneapolis-Moline UDLX Comfortractor, Red: 1954 Chevrolet 1/2 Ton Pickup Truck

Now, my Highlander doesn’t quite compare to some of these beauties, but I love it anyways! It helped me to brave the Saskatoon freeway system once again and after only one misstep I found my hotel and retired for a quiet afternoon of rest and then a nice swim. Unfortunately, today I have a rather loud family beside me in the hotel and all of their noise is coming through the connecting door so I’ll sign off now and go for a short walk to see what 36 degrees feels like! All my love and best regards to friends and family in B.C. and elsewhere.