More Grain, Museums, and Canadian Scenery

After spending Thursday night, August 27, in Yorkton, Saskatchewan, we decided to make a stop at the Saskatchewan Western Development Museum before we left Yorkton Friday morning. Saskatchewan has four different Western Development Museums in different towns, but we didn't stop at the one in Battleford because when we went by, the parking lot had four school buses and several cars there--looked a bit crowded! However, no one was at the one in Yorkton the next day, and their outdoor exhibit of old farm implements was much more extensive than the one in Battleford. Farmer Ernie just couldn't resist! I thought it would be rather boring, but I enjoyed the indoor exhibits immensely. I find any history fascinating, and the exhibits in this museum were extremely well displayed, which made it easy to become absorbed in all the intriguing information. When we started this trip, we knew next to nothing of Canada's geography and history, but now we're much more educated about our northern neighbor! Even the outdoor exhibits were displayed in a way to make them more interesting--I'd never seen so many old tractors and implements on one place! Of course Ernie loved it all!

Entrance to Western Development Museum in Yorkton, Saskatchewan

The display that immediately caught my eye was the winner of the Centennial Quilt Contest in 2005--the intricacies in this quilt were just amazing!

One of the many sheds housing tractors, wagons, combines, threshing machines, etc.--I think there were about six of these structures, all filled with machinery, in addition to the implements outside along the fence. There was also a sawmill and blacksmith shop.

Ernie inspecting one of the tractors

On our way out of town, we spotted this display of "Crops of the Parklands," which had plots of various crops grown in Saskatchewan with explanations of each crop. We had been discussing crops as we drove along the day before, trying to decide what all the crops were that we passed--we didn't recognize some of them and noticed some farmers harvesting what looked like weeds to us. So this display cleared up some of our confusion. We spent more than an hour reading all the info about the different crop plots--farming is very complicated! Another opportunity to expand our knowledge and keep learning, not to mention deepening our appreciation for farming and farmers! :)

Note the crop plots to the left and the sunflower plot (my favorite!) to the right of the sign

A wheat field behind the display

Later Friday afternoon we left Saskatchewan and crossed the border into Manitoba.

First views of Manitoba

Shortly after crossing into Manitoba, we found a little city park in Russell, Manitoba, offering free camping with free electricity. Even though they had no restrooms, we decided to stay and walk over to the co-op gas station/store next door. After setting up and eating some dinner, we took a walk around the town of Russell--very pretty, clean little town--we enjoyed our evening there! Saturday we drove across Manitoba under cloudy skies, and later in the afternoon stopped in Portage la Prairie to get the truck tires rotated and balanced and the oil changed. After some frustration and failure to find a place that could change the oil, we managed to get the tires rotated and balanced after a long wait, then proceeded toward Winnipeg.

One of many fields of sunflowers we passed. Apparently Manitoba is a major producer of sunflowers! These were looking pretty droopy since there was no sun for them, but I was amazed at the huge fields of sunflowers!

We should have spent the night in Portage la Prairie but decided to go on to Winnipeg, thinking it would be easy to find a place to stay there. Not so . . . we took the by-pass around the south side thinking we would find more on the outskirts but it was absolutely barren! So we took a road in toward Winnipeg but it was a pretty dumpy part of town. I guess we must have missed the best parts of Winnipeg, but we couldn't find anything that impressed us!

At least we were rewarded with a fantastic rainbow spanning the entire road after a rain! There was even a double rainbow above this one, but I couldn't get a good shot of it through the windshield.

We kept driving, thinking we would find either a campground or hotel somewhere between Winnipeg and the border with Ontario, but we found nothing! After driving through Yukon, BC, Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba, we decided Manitoba is our least favorite! Roads were inferior, and we just didn't find much to impress us (except the town of Russell just over the border and the tire store in Portage la Prairie)! Anyway, we ended up driving into Ontario before finding a place to spend the night--the only hotel room we could find in Kenora, Ontario (by that time it was too late, and we were much too tired to try to find a campground).

Sunday morning we found McLeod Park in Kenora--peaceful, beautiful city park on the shore of Lake of the Woods with lots of lovely flower beds.

Ernie caught me admiring the fountain in the lake when I didn't know he was taking pictures.

Ernie testing to see if his arm was long enough to take our picture :) Not bad

Sailboat on the lake

Instead of driving south from Winnipeg into Minnesota as we originally planned, we had decided to drive east to Thunder Bay, Ontario, then drive south along Lake Superior to Duluth. The drive east to Thunder Bay was beautiful, so we were glad we changed routes.

Rock walls on either side of the road--beautiful drive!

One of the many lakes we passed between Kenora and Thunder Bay, Ontario

We stopped just west of Thunder Bay and spent Sunday night in a campground after a day of beautiful scenery! Monday should find us back in Minnesota!