USELESS FACTS AND FIGURES

Duration of trip – 114 days, 8 hours

Distance travelled – 18,137mi., 29,189 km.

Average distance travelled per day – 158 mi., 255 km.

Volume of gas purchased – 6,175 L. (which if you are interested would fill a 1.8m cube and weigh 4,693kg)

Cost of gas purchased – $7,292.24 (ouch)

Cheapest gas – $ .86/L in Tennessee

Most expensive gas – $ 1.66/L Dawson City, Yukon

Fuel consumption – 13.2 mpg, 21.4 L/100km

Cost of gas / km. – $ .25

Number of countries visited – 3

Number of states visited – 21

Number of provinces/territories visited – 9

Number of photographs taken – 5,180

LESSONS LEARNED – in no particular order

No one country has the market cornered on nice people, or assholes for that matter

Buying gas shouldn’t be more difficult than buying a handgun

No one should wear a fanny pack, no one, ever

There are more good beers than bad beers

There are more bad wines than bad beers

Sometimes the road less travelled is that for an excellent reason

Never pass a chance to dump your waste water – you don’t know when the next opportunity will present itself

When in the north never pass a gas station

Never assume that the locals know anything about the world around them more than a mile from their home, no, make that a half mile or as far as they can see, which ever distance is shorter

Take the time to be friendly with people, good things generally happen

A bad day of fishing is still better than a good day in the office

When you are on a twisty, neck wrecking, white knuckle road and suddenly there is a sign saying twisting road ahead – pay attention to it – the road is about to get a lot worse than you ever imagined possible

Not all speed bumps are created equal, or even marked

All fishing regulations are written by committees made up of:
-lawyers
-socially challenged biologists who have not mastered any human communication skills
-people who do not want anyone to fish, ever
-bureaucrats whose jobs and future livelihoods depend upon interpreting the aforementioned regulations

Promotional travel brochures have the accuracy of political platforms and are written by people who already live there and want you to visit, sometimes apparently just to share in their misery but mostly so you will spend your money there. Choose your destinations wisely, life is short.

Prepare well but remember all plans are STC – subject to change. The happy accidents that come from spontaneous decisions are all the sweeter and more memorable

Just because you can dress and grow hair and a beard like on Duck Dynasty doesn’t mean you should. That look is getting very old, very fast and it always was stupid

True friends are rare, hold them close and treat them well

Marry your best friend. Everything is more fun when you share it with your best friend.

To quote Dorothy, “There’s no place like home.”

IN CLOSING

After 114 days of writing to this blog and as the last standing contributor it will be hard to stop. For me, through repetition it has become a habit, a daily mental exercise in finding new ways to describe some amazing things, in words and pictures, to share with those of you who have been kind enough to read it, in part, or God forbid in whole, a way to try and share what was a phenomenal experience for all of us with our friends and family.

Regardless of the quality of the product what started out as an idea for a simple way to keep family and friends informed of our progress became a practice of observing and recording so it could be made as real as possible both for those following from home and for us in the future as we relive the trip. From my perspective my experience was enriched by the exercise of recording it. I know I speak for all of us when I say how much we appreciated knowing that somewhere out there in the ether, our friends and family, were reading and sharing in some manner what we were experiencing – thank you all for that, it brought us comfort.

So long from the BRT, the armadillo is just resting, not dead.

And with that I set down my digital pen…..until the next time.

Day 113 – July 25

After posting the previous days blog we headed for Ikea – just because it is there. Montreal has 3 Ikeas and we can’t get one? As always we managed to find numerous things that we didn’t know we desperately needed before we went in. I also had a small order from an Ikea junkie friend at home to fill.

There was no need for a GPS anymore once we broke free from the the spider web of roads that circle Montreal and were on the 20 east. This was a driving day. A familiar road with little reason to stop except to eat and buy gas.

The kilometres flew by under the clear blue skies. St.-Hyacinthe, Quebec, Rivière-du-Loup with a short pause to admire one of our favourite houses, a red metal roofed stone building nestled amongst maple trees with a beautiful view of theSt. Lawrence, before we headed inland towards Edmundston. We crossed into New Brunswick and its higher speed limits at about 6:30, 7:30 AST. Our plan for the following day was to meet Kenny on the road as he headed to an airshow at Osh Kosh with his father. We wanted to get as far into New Brunswick as possible so our paths could cross before their turn off into the States at Woodstock.

Referring to our Woodall’s guide Diane found an RV park outside of Edmundston, the Panoramic 86. Although the guide promised 180 sites, it was obvious to us as we pulled into the park that few if any sites would be available. Of all of the private parks we had stayed at this one had the most obvious large population of seasonal residents. Decks, strings of lights, satellite dishes and out buildings abounded. However at the Panoramic 86 there was yet another level of settlement – golf carts.

We were used to seeing golf carts used by camp hosts and park staff but had not seen this proliferation of carts before in the hands of campers. The streets, complete with names and sign posts, that wound through the park were alive with the traffic of these little whirring canopied electric vehicles. As with all such toys there seemed to be a competition amongst their owners around who could add the most features to the basic model, be it a special paint job, called to attention by the license plate ‘pimped’ or the flashing led lights within the rims of another. The prize winner for me however was a fully white canopied cart with plastic side and rear windows, reminiscent of the Pope mobile. A quick check of the roof canopy showed that it lacked any bump big enough to accommodate a Papal mitre so I assumed that Pope Francis (only his closest friends call him Pope Frank) was not in fact vacationing in Edmundston this year.

Settled in

Our site had power, water and sewer, which provided an opportunity to empty our tanks before heading home. The time zone change made for a late supper of barbecued hamburgers that we had bought in a butcher shop a couple days earlier. We watched a DVD before turning in for the night. After 113 days of this routine we were both aware that this might be the last night that we slept in the BRT- a mixed emotion for us.

Day 114 – July 26

We awoke to find that our clear starry skies of the night before had been replaced with overcast and cool temperatures, a fore bearer of the heavy rain promised in the weather reports for New Brunswick and Nova Scotia the previous day. We were on the road early as this was to be our last day of travelling and we wanted to be home well before dark. Because we had pushed the night before we were well positioned to rendezvous with Ken and Ken on their way to the Osh Kosh air show. We passed into rain not far outside of Edmundston and began texting with Ken as we drove along. He was on the road much earlier than us and was into New Brunswick by the time we made first contact. They had been into heavy rain since leaving Nova Scotia so we were prepared for a full day of wet driving, ironically one of the first such days since we had left Nova Scotia – such a Maritime way of being welcomed home.

Our paths crossed at Kings Landing at around noon. Not being dissuaded by the notion of eating and getting gas we stopped at a Petro Can restaurant for lunch and had a chance to catch up with both of the Kens who were off on a male bonding airplane fanatics trip. Ken junior had a lovely small wooden sailboat in tow, hand made by Ken senior many years ago, that was now destined to sail on the cottage lake in Alberta. I’m sure that some on the road may have thought it as a bit of an over reaction to the pelting rains to be towing an emergency sailboat behind but I bet they laughed at Noah as well. Right Noah, 40 days and nights of rain, how come Cindy Day hasn’t said anything about that. By the way I want my power nailer back before you sail off, and what is it with those unicorns.

The Kens head west

The rain continued as we drove towards Nova Scotia but had no perceptible impact on the cocoon of insect carcasses that now constituted the exterior finish of the beast. Like the mounted animal heads we had seen in so many locations on our trip these multi coloured splats have become the visible trophies of our adventure. At Sackville New Brunswick we stopped in to see Jane and Ike and visit with the LRT for a while. The cold rain of Northern New Brunswick had abated, replaced with overcast skies, warm temperature and oppressive humidity which required a quick change of clothes.

After a refreshment break we were on the road again. We were trying to make time as our niece and her family were returning to Curaçao on the weekend and we wanted to see them before they left. We arrived in Beaver Bank around 7:00, in time for a visit before the kids were sent to bed. At 10:00 we finally rolled up our side street and turned off the ignition. After 114 days of flawless performance the BRT came to rest. We sat for a moment in the dark, quietly contemplating what we had just completed. I’d be less than honest if I didn’t admit to more than a bit of sadness to see the adventure come to an end, as all good things must.

Entering the house was an odd sensation, a strong sense of familiarity but yet after 4 months a certain strangeness as well. Our nephew Colin had done an awesome job of keeping the house in order so in some respects it felt like we had never left, like we had just awoken from some very vivid and strangely linear dream……

For those who have been regular followers of these ramblings, there will be one more posting in a day or so, I just need some time to gather a few thoughts.

Day 112 – July 24

Exiting Pickerel Park required a bit of backtracking through the maze of roads we had taken the previous day. We found our way back to the # 2 east and began to wind our way through some interesting local tourist attractions such as the Millhaven Correctional Institute and the Frontenac Minimum Security Institution. Incarceration seemed to be a bit of a cottage industry in the area. I made a mental note, avoid picking up any hitch hikers dressed either in bold horizontal black and white stripes (very unflattering for the heavy set criminal by the way) or in a fluorescent hunter orange jump suit.

By marked contrast not far down the road we drove through Bath and Collins Bay, two very well heeled communities where the local energy seemed to be more focused on mowing expansive lawns and filling the numerous marinas with large power boats. A bicycle path, whose only occupants seemed to be several golf carts paralleled the highway. Gananoque passed by uneventfully as we moved on to the 1000 Islands Parkway. I got bored at about 3 of trying to verify accuracy of that number.

Whether there is more or less than a 1000 ‘Islands’ may be a moot point, but by my observation every rock big enough to perch more than one seagull that dares to so much as poke its head above the surface of the water has something built on it, be it a ‘simple’ boathouse and dock or some turret festooned building that by comparison makes Casa Loma look like a mobile home. There is serious money here. It occurred to me that scientists should investigate if rising sea levels are really being caused by global warming or possibly by the sinking of this real estate under the burden of the crushing weight of these steroid popping ‘get away’ cottages. Who really needs a cottage bigger than a Wallmart with a boat moored next to it big enough to dwarf half of the ships of the Canadian Naval Fleet.

The ‘cottage’

We stopped in Brockville for a coffee and had a quick walk around town. Beautiful brick houses lined the street and the downtown boasted a wide array of heritage buildings. However a couple of storefronts were vacant and had ‘for lease’ signs in their windows and there was a tattoo parlour on the Main Street, a sure sign that rental values are decreasing. My guess is that like many small town retailers Brockville is fighting a battle against the big box stores, I hope they win. It would be a shame to see this pretty streetscape become a sea of plywood windows.

We planned to spend the night in a hotel in Montreal and I had the address plugged into my GPS. Unfortunately a flurry of road work had closed the most direct route but with GPS and finally iPhone with google maps in hand we arrived at the Hotel Brossard. We had stayed at this hotel last October when we flew to Montreal to buy the BRT. As we looked from our room out to the beast parked in the same spot she had been parked those 9 months earlier in some ways it seemed like only yesterday that we were here and in other ways it seemed like forever since we made those first steps towards this great adventure we have been having.

After a quick change of clothes we drove to the nearest Metro station and took the Metro to Old Montreal – the narrow cobblestone streets of Vieux-Montreal are no place for the anachronistic bulk of the beast, she is no Calèche. We walked the streets for a while, stopping to admire Notre Dame, a busker plying his trade and the work of the local artists. Old Montreal is such a phenomenal capsule of culture, with such fond memories for us – we briefly honeymooned here in the snow almost 34 years ago on a budget that today wouldn’t gas up the BRT – that just walking the streets seems like an escape to another time and another world.

Notre Dame

Working the crowd

We found a small restaurant that offered food we were unlikely to find at home, a mozzarella bar, ‘il mangia foco’. It specialized in various mozzarella cheeses, pizzas and other fare Italien – a great celebratory meal as the miles rapidly brought us closer to home and family. We started with two glasses of Prosecco and then sampled a smoked mozzarella with porchetta and smoked dried tomato side dishes. The cheese was superb and the tomatoes were like little candy smoke bombs. Shared wood fired margherita and quartre fromage pizzas, strawberry shortcake served on slate slabs followed by expressos completed an amazing meal. The walk back to the Metro was appreciated.

Il mangia foco

When we got back to the parking lot at the Metro station we were greeted by the flashing lights of police cars and a milling throng of people. Many folks had taken up positions along the nearby highway in portable chairs. We could not fathom what was going on and were none the wiser when we asked some francophones who were perched in the back of their SUV. The best we could come up with was something was going to happen in 10 minutes at 10:00. We eventually figured out that there was going to be a fireworks show. July 24 didn’t ring a bell for us but a quick Google search informed us that we were in the midst of a summer long international fireworks festival and that July 24 was the night Croatia was performing with the theme of Artificial Intelligence so we settled into our front row seats in the BRT and waited.

We were not disappointed. A fantastic display of spectacular fireworks amazed us for 30 minutes. Again our timing was impeccable. With the aid of google maps we returned to our hotel and the luxury of a king sized bed.

Oooh

aah!

Day 111 – July 23

A clear sky greeted us as we headed out towards Coburg, our mid day destination for the day. My older sister lives there and as our Ontario route is taking a more southerly turn than I had anticipated months earlier I wanted to take advantage and have a visit. Although driving due south and intercepting the 401 east would have been the fastest route we opted to head east, tracking north of Lake Simcoe, through Orillia and then via the rectilinear grid of southerly and easterly roads towards Coburg.

On the way we passed through countless small Ontario towns, many of them not much more than clusters of the ubiquitous brick houses that dot the Ontario landscape. One such town, Ramara, just east of Lake Simcoe, distinguished itself from others along the way by decorating its Main Street with old bicycles pressed into a new life as flower pots.

Re-cycled

In between the small towns were stretches of farmland boasting crops of corn and wheat. It appeared we had to drive to Ontario to find a field of wheat. Go figure. Along the road we stopped at a shop called Primitive Design. What caught my eye was a huge Transformer-like statue in front of the building. We stopped to take a picture and were drawn inside to what was advertised as an 8,000 square foot warehouse. The transformers, made of an agglomeration of auto and machine parts were amazing and set up as a fund raiser for the local volunteer fire department. Inside the warehouse was an array of third world crafts that really defies description. Incredibly large and intricate wood carvings of birds, dragons, lizards alongside stone work, garden ornaments, it just went on and on. The prices were very low. Luckily nothing would fit in the BRT.

Transformational

My GPS got us to my sister’s address flawlessly. My sister was in the middle of a sewing marathon. Although she has been legally blind for many years she has enough residual sight that with aid of strong glasses she can use her sewing machine. What she has chosen to do is to buy fabric and make sun caps for female chemo patients, polar fleece toques for the children of women in shelters and blankets for their mothers. It is an amazing selfless gesture from someone who was not dealt the best hand of health cards herself.

After a couple of hours of catching up we headed east again, working along the #2 highway as it hugged the coast. Our guide books noted only a couple of campgrounds further east of Coburg and we chose Pickerel Park which, as we were to soon find out was located at the end of a confusing maze of left and rights. This was a large park of over 200 sites, and seems to focus on seasonal campers, understandable as I doubt there is much drive by traffic there.

We met a couple with a black labrador retriever who were seasonal campers and who invited us over to their campfire. They lived close to Kingston and like us they were new to RVing, providing us with some common ground for conversation.

Day 110 – July 22

One of the benefits of only having an electrical hook up is that it takes very little time to disconnect and move on. We were heading for Manitoulin Island and the ferry to Tobermory. The ferry had crossings at 9:10 AM and 1:30 PM. We couldn’t reasonably make the first one and had lots of time to make the second crossing so we didn’t have to rush, still we were on the road by 8:30.

Again the drive, except for the place names, could have been anywhere in Nova Scotia. We were now skirting the north shore of Lake Huron but even while driving close to the coast the dense evergreen forests blocked most of the water views. After crossing over the swing bridge that joins the northern end of Manitoulin Island to the mainland we made one stop to look out over one of the inlets of Georgian Bay before arriving at South Baymouth, the northern terminus of the ferry, at 11:00, two and a half hours before the scheduled 1:30 ferry departure.

Could be home

The Chi-Cheemaun

This gave us some time to explore the few shops that faced into the ferry terminal parking lot. However, true to my general experience with captive patrons and end of the world destinations, these shops specialized in overpriced food and tacky offshore-made souvenirs that cause you to wonder not only why someone would sell these insults to consumerism but even more quizzically who would ever buy or display them.

Unlike our last fog bound sea adventure from Whittier to Valdez Alaska (ah yes we’ll always have Whittier) based on the view from on shore, this would prove to be a much more scenic voyage.

True to my clear sky founded weather prognostication the trip was not only fog free but also very calm and warm. We were able to spend the entire trip on the stern deck benches, both of us regretting having switched from shorts to pants for the voyage. The expanse of water in all directions did make it hard to remember that this was a fresh water journey.

Diane busied herself with a word puzzle while I caught up on some draft blog material, my train of thought interrupted only by some five year oldish blond cherub whose frequent monosyllabic vocalizations were delivered with red face, clenched fists and bulging eyes at 110 decibels. Thoughts of what I would look like at 86 years of age, my earliest release date from prison with good behaviour, dissuaded me from investigating how far those nails-on-chalkboard screams would carry from the waters at the stern of the ship – one can but dream.

We arrived at Tobemory 3:00 in the afternoon and headed south and east towards Collingwood, our somewhat arbitrary destination for the night. The trees of Manitoulin Island were replaced with the more agricultural lands of the Bruce Peninsula. Fields spotted with rolled bales of hay or expanses of golden grass awaiting harvest flanked the highway while herds of grazing cattle were a frequent sight.

We drove through Wiarton, yes the home of Wiarton Willie the legendary Ontario groundhog who with varying success every February 2, Groundhog Day, gets to predict the end of winter through the presence or absence of his shadow. Being a bright sunny day, the landscape was strewn with shadows but despite my best observations I could not trace one back to the feet of the famous little rodent. I’d be less than honest if I didn’t admit to some disappointment at this missed encounter with a celebrity. My life list of celebrities sightings consists of seeing Marg Helgenberger (Catherine Willows on CSI) in the London Airport years ago (she looks a lot better on TV). Frankly I’m not sure one name even comprises a list. Willie would have been a nice addition.

Just before Collingwood we stopped at the Craigleith RV Park. As in many of the privately run parks we have stopped in there were numerous ‘seasonal’ residents. These are the people who stay in one campsite all summer. The seasonal residents are best identified by their accoutrements. The entry level requirement for a seasonal camper is solar powered lights, lots of solar powered lights, enough for an international airport runway. The next level is a deck – lattice work underneath is de rigour, then the truly committed seasonals have gardens – flower and vegetable gardens. The topper is out buildings, sheds to hold all the stuff required to maintain the other stuff and a place to mount your satellite dish. Did I mention the satellite dishes? Most of these parks have more satellite dishes than a NASA tracking station. I have considered wearing a tinfoil hat to prevent further hair loss from the irradiation. The occasional visitor like us stands out like a sore thumb in parks like these, we are the transient population of these otherwise established communities.

Being July 22 we were treated to our fourth full moon of the trip, and our last. We watched it fondly before turning in for the night.

Day 109 – July 21

After a pleasant stay in one of the best appointed parks we have been in we were on the road and heading for Sault Ste. Marie. Driving through this part of Ontario, with its granite rocks and spruce forests, is very reminiscent of driving through Nova Scotia and the views we are now getting of Lake Superior could very easily be views to the ocean as Superior stretches uninterrupted to the horizon. I suspect that on a dark windy day it looks even more ocean like. Fewer bridges under construction and a decrease in truck traffic, probably due to it being Sunday, allowed us to make better time than on the two previous days.

Somewhere on Superior

We passed through White River, north of Lake Superior, whose main claim to fame is being the home of the orphaned black bear cub that was bought there by Canadian soldier Lieutenant Harry Colbourn and eventually donated to the London Zoo to become the inspiration for A.A. Milne’s Winnie The Pooh. After our trip to the Winnie The Pooh Gallery in Winnipeg on July 18 it was an interesting coincidence to close the loop on that part of the story.

Sault Ste. Marie was behind us by mid afternoon and we moved from the watershed of Lake Superior to that of Lake Huron. Although our maps did not show a lot of campgrounds there were several options available to us. We checked out a couple before settling on the ‘Chutes’ provincial park in Massey. The park was situated at the falls in the Aux Chutes River and had generous treed sites with electricity. After hooking up the electricity to the BRT we followed a well marked and well used trail system with viewing platforms and several bridges over that provided great views of the river and its multiple falls and rapids.

After 45 minutes of walking we had lost ambition to prepare the barbecued pork chops that were tentatively on the menu for the night and settled for beans and left over sausages while we watched some of the DVD’s that Ken and Renee had loaned us.

Day 108 – July 20

We were on the road by 9:00 having had a mosquito free night. On leaving we noticed a sculpture on the top of a post in the parking lot that depicted some outsized mosquito armed with a knife and fork carrying some forlorn looking camper off towards the woods. Should have paid more attention when we drove in.

About 30 minutes down the road we passed through another time zone. We were now on Eastern Standard Time, now only one hour off of time at home. I loved time zones when we were going west, less so now that we are focused on heading east and loose an hour of travelling time as we cross into each zone.

We stopped at a sign pointing to Kakakea Falls. There was a sign as you entered the parking lot that said all cars must have a permit posted and a group of visitors were cued up at a pay and display machine. As I could hear the waterfall loudly from the parking lot I walked to the edge of the lot to a viewing platform to see a very impressive waterfall of maple syrup coloured water. I walked to the the still busy machine to see what the cost was and was shocked to see that it was $5.25 for 2 hours. Really? I parked in downtown Winnipeg for $1 an hour. I fully support user pay fees but feel that they have to reflect the costs of maintaining the related infrastructure. All I could see here was a short boardwalk and two viewing platforms, a 2 minute stop. As striking as the falls were, Ontario hadn’t created nor were they maintaining them. At $5.25 for 2 hours I felt like I had just been to a Mother Nature peep show sponsored by the Government of Ontario.

Kakakea Falls

One more peek

Undeterred by this provincially sponsored highway robbery further on we turned on to the road to Ouimet Canyon, a spot that had been recommended to us. It was a 45 minute loop walk with two viewing platforms into the Canyon. The site was accessible and had an extensive ramp system leading to a bridge. A lot of expensive infrastructure. Admission was $2/person – a fair price. The canyon itself was a striking and unique geologic formation but frankly after the Grand, Bryce, Zion Canyon triumvirate of May and the Rockies of this month it is hard to be impressed by canyons and geology any more.

Ouimet Gorge

Our progress was slow again. Today the semi traffic was heavy and with the hilly terrain and lack of passing lanes the semis were either holding up traffic while they laboured up hill or breathing down our collar as they rocketed downhill. We had hoped to make it to outside Marathon for the night and found a really nice municipally owned site on Penn Lake right in Marathon with full services, including cable, Internet, and free showers. The facilities were well maintained, in almost new condition, a very impressive park.

Day 107 – July 1 9

As my iPhone binged to an early morning incoming message we awoke to some bad news. Ken and Renee’s dog of 12 years, Maggie, had died suddenly and unexpectedly the previous day. To add to the loss for both of them Ken was on his way to Nova Scotia. Unless you are a pet owner or are close to one you can’t appreciate the bond that forms with a pet or the grief that comes from loosing one. Maggie was not just a happy pile of fur with a bowl in the corner. Maggie was a key part of Ken and Renee’s daily life. She was Family. Although the most rapidly ageing member of that family Maggie did her best to keep up with all of the family activities. She never accepted no longer being a puppy. Her ageing body was an inconvenience not an excuse. Maggie’s loss will leave a big hole for them as well as for their other dog Skeeter, Maggie’s constant companion. Our thoughts were with them all day.

We awoke to clear skies free of the oppressive humidity that had plagued us while we walked Winnipeg the previous day. We crossed into Ontario at about 11:00 and noted the abrupt change in the landscape. The flat almost treeless prairies were quickly replaced by the granite outcrops and evergreen forests of the Canadian Shield. There was an almost instant proliferation of dark blue lakes on both sides of the road. My prairie dormant casting arm began to twitch.

Our somewhat ambitious target was the eastern side of Thunder Bay. What we hadn’t counted on was that the Trans Canada Highway through this part of Ontario is one lane with a 90 kph speed limit. Exacerbating this was the plethora of road construction projects underway. Ontario also appears to be undertaking a major program of bridge rehabilitation which resulted in countless single lane bridges preceded on each side by diminished speed limits and timed signal lights, the combination of which made it obvious to us by mid afternoon that we would not see Thunder Bay that night.

We passed by Lake of the Woods and I felt like I was in an episode of HGTV’s ‘Cottage Country’. Based on the development around the lakes and the boats on them we were in quintessential Ontario cottage country. Our first stop was in Kenora for a coffee and muffin at Tim’s. Driving on the TCH through downtown Kenora I wouldn’t have been surprised to see a sign for Dave’s Vinyl Cafe.

Just past Dryden we noticed a field full of large sheet metal scraps and someone busily picking up the pieces. A quick glance back revealed the source, a now almost roofless barn with the remaining pieces of its metal roof twisted up like a discarded sardine can. Clearly there had been some major winds through here very recently. We stopped at the Ekli’s sheep farm and sheepskin clothing factory that Sean and Carla had mentioned in their blog. The cashier there was talking about the near tornado winds that had passed through the night before. We appeared to be playing tornado roulette. I hoped our luck would continue.

Around 5:30 we drove into Upsala, middle of nowhere, Ontario. This seemed as good a spot as any to stop and we pulled into the Can Op RV Park on Milton Lake. Although the amenities were in sore need of some upgrades the sites were large and there was a nice view over Milton Lake which mercifully was also providing access to a strong breeze that helped to keep the mosquito population at bay.

As the sun set and the wind dropped we retired to the relative safety of the BRT for a reprise of the fish chowder of earlier in the week nicely augmented with some biscuits fresh from the oven. As we sat inside there seemed to be an inordinate number of our little winged friends buzzing about. We did not want a replay of B.C.’s Meziadin Lake. This time it was easy to figure out the entry point as dozens of mosquitoes were trapped in between the screen door and the outside door. Whether they had been caught in between the doors earlier or somehow were continuing to make their way in was hard to say but it was obvious that the poorly weather stripped screen door was not providing a major obstacle between them and us.

Sunset at Upsala

Some Scotch tape, a shopping bag and an old blanket were brought into play and we soon had an almost impermeable barrier in place as we headed to bed. As we head deeper into bug country some remedial weather stripping work may be required. I sense a visit to Canadian Tire in my near future.

Day 106 – July 18

Undone again by an unmarked time zone change we were off on our planned day in Winnipeg a little later than expected. Our first stop was the Assiniboine Park, according to our tourist information, the home of the Winnipeg Zoo, a sculpture garden, a gallery and areas of open space. The sculpture garden was what we wanted to see so after finding a spot for the beast in one of the many parking lots we headed in that direction.

True to the guide books there were substantial expanses of open space. The sculpture garden was adjacent to a beautiful English Garden with interconnecting hard surface circular paths. A crew of gardeners were busy removing plants that were past their peak while a small rabbit was busy munching on the fresh green leaves of the new plants. All of of the numerous pieces in the sculpture garden were the work of sculptor, Leo Mol, and most of them were commissions by local families and businesses. It did strike me as somewhat strange however that the sculptures could generally be split into two categories, old men with their clothes on and young thin women with, yes you guessed it, their clothes off and being made of bronze clearly showing the effects of the cold. Just saying.

Just saying…

On our way back to the vehicle we saw a sign for a gallery in one of the attractive buildings that skirted the open space. We went inside and spent an hour walking the three levels of the gallery. Of great interest was the Winnie the Pooh gallery. You may recall that the famous primary character of A.A. Milne’s iconic tales, Winnie the Pooh, was named after the city of Winnipeg. A Canadian soldier had bought the bear, which he named Winnipeg after the his adopted home town, and when transferred to England ended up donating him to the London zoo where A.A. Milne’s son, Christopher Robin, became fascinated with him, shortening his name to Winnie. And the rest, as they say, is history. It was Interesting to see some of the original illustrations from the pen of E.H. Shepard. A.A. Milne recognized that the illustrations played such an important role in the popularity of his work that he shared his royalties with Shepard.

After leaving the park we crossed back over the Assiniboine River and headed towards downtown, specifically the Forks, named after the adjacent confluence of the Assiniboine and Red Rivers. We found a metered spot of substantial size for the BRT and walked down to visit the market, a space very reminiscent of the Saint John’s city market. We had lunch there and walked back to the BRT past the still-under-construction Museum of Human Rights, a striking building scheduled to open in 2014.

The Forks Market

Future Museum of Human Rights

As our curb side parking spot became a traffic lane at 3:30 we had to move to a parking lot before heading north into Winnipeg’s Exchange District, where many of Winnipeg’s older buildings are located. In walking through the area we came across the main stage of Winnipeg’s long standing Fringe Festival which had just started the day before. We listened to one of the performers and visited some of the many kiosks that filled the surrounding public space offering everything from henna tattoos and vintage clothes to balloon sculptures. There was a contagious party atmosphere in the area and one amusing character who stood in front of the main stage dancing who, based on his enthusiastic but spastic moves, was either a disciple of the ‘dance like no one is watching’ philosophy or a recent graduate of the Elaine Benis School of Dancing.

The Exchange District

Dance Like No One is Watching

We headed back to the BRT and after giving brief consideration to having dinner at a restaurant decided we were too tired to enjoy the treat and headed to our campsite, the Rocky Garden RV Park north of Richer, about 20 minutes away. We had reserved a spot by email earlier in the day. Hoping to snag a pizza on the way we saw every other kind of fast food except that so we were enticed by the fruit stand at the Richer turn off which advertised fresh corn. Run by a personable character who could have sold parkas in the Gobi desert we sampled several of his fresh produce. At his insistence we took a bite from a raw peaches and cream ear of corn to taste the sweetness. By the time we left we had our corn (including the gratis ear we had sampled), potato and cheese pierogis, honey, local strawberries, cherries and white organic nectarines from California that made nectarines I had before seem bland, these were so sweet.

We checked into our site and were quickly set up. Supper was straightforward – pan fried pierogis, fresh corn and strawberries with the last of our Ben and Jerry’s ice cream for desert. We had been in touch with Ken during the day hoping to meet up with him on his much faster paced drive to Nova Scotia but realized this wasn’t practical. After supper while we watched a video on TV a thunder storm passed through, notable not for its multiple flashes of lightning and associated thunder so much as by its torrential rain. It was so loud inside our little fiberglas tube that we literally could not hear the TV at full volume. As it was already dark there was no way to check to see if there was a funnel cloud associated with this I checked on line for tornado alerts in the area. In my mind RV parks look a lot like mobile home parks, known tornado magnets, so I was being extra vigilant.

The storm passed as quickly as it arrived and by the time we went to bed the sky was clear and full of stars.

Day 104 – July 16

We were back on our regular schedule and awake at 7:00. We wanted to head into Saskatoon and visit the ‘Taste of Saskatchewan’ event which promised a variety of ethnic food booths set up in a park downtown. After searching for the event venue we circled the block a couple of times to find a good parking spot for the beast which, as luck would have it, turned out to be right across from the event site. However, as fate would have it, we had to walk 10 minutes to find a bank to get change to feed the voracious parking meter. We took advantage of our financial side bar to drop into the CAA office and pick up some maps of the prairies, the detail of our Milepost guide has spoiled us for the minutiae not found in some of our larger scale maps.

Once the logistics of parking were worked out we explored the site. There were a couple of dozen booths set up offering things as mundane as pop and water to the more esoteric African Stew (no giraffe in the stew – I asked). Purchases were made by way of tokens, bought for $2.50 at booths throughout the site. It is a clever arrangement, no need for everyone to keep cash, it speeds up transactions but also tokens are clever, like using VISA, you loose track of what the real cost of things are.We sampled African, Mexican, Brazilian and Chinese with a finish of Canadian ice cream – a very multicultural lunch.

We also wanted to visit the Affinity Gallery in the Saskatchewan Craft Council which is dedicated to the celebration fine craft. There was an installation themed ‘à table’ which highlighted metal work around the theme of food – its eating and preparation. You can see the works at http://www.saskcraftcouncil.org/gallery/2013/a-table.php.

Interestingly there was a piece called ‘Dragonfly Bowl’ by Elizabeth Goluch, a Nova Scotian artist. Diane has a piece of her Lizzie Bugs jewellery. The gallery staff were very friendly and we ended up giving them a tour of the BRT. After a quick strategy meeting in the BRT curb side we decided to head towards Regina, not quite a spin of the roulette wheel but without any particular destination in mind, so long as we are heading east, anything goes.

Dragonfly Bowl

Our walk uptown from the spacious downtown park and our drive across the river to the gallery reinforced what we had been told by Chris and Kirk following their visit here for the Jazz Festival. Saskatoon is a pleasant and interesting city. It really deserved more time to explore but we are both becoming mindful of our schedule and we want to be back home before August, we wouldn’t want our trip to cut into our summer vacation time back home. Have I mentioned home much we are enjoying being retired?

As we moved away from Saskatoon the land really began to flatten with only the odd patch of trees interrupting an otherwise seamless horizon. Canola and alfalfa still appear to be the primary crops dressing the roadside in contrasting fields of blue green and neon yellow. As we approached Regina some quick research showed that the campgrounds were on the eastern side of Regina, luckily accessible via the ring road that circles the southern part of the city. We pulled into the Kings Acres Campgrounds which was very similar to the Saskatoon 16 West RV Park where we had stayed the previous night.

It was another empty the fridge night so supper was easy and we had a relaxing evening broken up only by the entertainment of a couple who pulled into the site next to us to set up a tent. They were about our age but something about the awkwardness of their conversation gave us the impression that they were a recent couple and based on the newness of the gear camping appeared to be a new experience for them. The tent was just out of the box and they appeared overwhelmed by the plethora of bungie corded poles and amorphous pile of nylon that rolled out on the ground. At one point the man of the couple resorted to reading the instruction manual, a humiliating action for any man, topped only by stopping and asking for directions, even when clearly lost.

However eventually the pile of nylon and poles slowly began to take on the general appearance of a tent and when they finally realized that the last set of poles left on the ground were not in fact spare parts they had a shelter for the night that resembled a tent much more than the collapsed parachute it could have been taken for a hour before. No set up records broken but as a new couple they had built a memory as well as a tent and they sat for a while and admired their work.

We reviewed our pile of accumulated tourist brochures trying to find highlights for our anticipated visit to Regina the following day. We left the task uncompleted as we went to bed.

Day 105 – July 17

We spent some additional time at breakfast reviewing the travel brochures and on line info about Regina. Although feeling somewhat guilty, neither of us saw much to warrant engaging in the early morning traffic we saw passing Regina bound on the Trans Canada. Possibly we sold Regina short. In my former municipal bureaucratic life I had been constantly reminded by one of HRH’s female Councillors of the virtues of Regina, how in comparison to us they had it right. To my closest of friends I referred to these tirades as her ‘Regina Monologues’ and I was curious to see what, if anything, substantiated the claims. However I no longer felt the obligation to take a busman’s holiday and we headed east towards Manitoba.

As we approached the eastern boundary of Saskatchewan we had our first sighting of windmills. By comparison to what we had seen in California and other states it was a very small farm with most of the mills either stopped or just perceptibly moving. Considering the expansive uninhabited landscape I was surprised by the lack of effort to take advantage of the wind. Maybe when you are up to your eyeballs in one of the greatest, all be it diminishing, reserves of petroleum in the world you really don’t spend much time thinking about alternate energy. Or possibly the cattle, sometimes the only visible living thing within miles of the highway, have developed a lobby complaining that windmill noise make their steaks tough.

Around noon we stopped at Moosomin, one of those little nubs of human habitation that seem to spring up anywhere two roads cross in the prairies, for a coffee break and some planning strategy for our approach to the ‘Peg’, yet some 4 hours off according to my GPS .

We crossed into Manitoba around 1:00. We have one ‘prairie’ province left and so far we have not encountered the ‘deadly boring roads of endless wheat fields punctuated only by iconic grain silos’ that we have been warned of by others. Possibly our more southerly route has by passed these iconic scenes.

We arrived on the westerly outskirts of Winnipeg around 5:00 and pulled into the Winnipeg West KOA campsite, a somewhat less well appointed KOA than we have seen in other cities but quite acceptable right along the banks of the very muddy Assiniboin River. We had identified a number of sights in Winnipeg so our plan for the next day was to spend some time there before heading on.

Supper was a delicious fish chowder, made using one of the two remaining fillets of lake trout from Lake Labarge.