We stopped in at a farmer's market this day (perfect timing for lunch) and got to know some nice locals of a tiny town who told us about this artesian well we would encounter down the road. We filled our bottles and cooled off our faces and necks as it was a Very hot day.
Found a great place to camp that night-- another road-side park. Here's Keith busy with his evening chore. He cooks dinner while I set up our stuff inside the tent. He took this one with a self-timer that is triggered by your eyes looking into the lens, which is why he looks very alert.
As SOON as we crossed into Manitoba (it's like they respect borders...) there were thousands of these little white butterflies fluttering around the wildflowers near the road.
This day (coming into Winnipeg area) there was a bad forest fire somewhere which clouded the sky we were biking through for 50 miles. Not easy on the lungs, or the eyes. The sky and landscape were pretty bleak that day so we really welcomed the sight of this beautiful field of sunflowers that stretched as far as we could see to the horizon and right and left from this point. It was like millions and millions of faces anticipating something.
And from this angle it felt like being shunned by millions and millions of sunflower citizens.
Across from the sunflower field...
We had a wonderful time staying in Winnipeg at Keith's second cousin's home. Although his second cousin, Dennis, was out of town, his wife, Marilyn, was a wonderful host and very fun to get to know. This night Keith and I wanted to contribute by making dinner so we got the ingredients for making enchiladas which I had earlier in the week been talking about craving and wanting to make. These were my first enchiladas and, I must say, were pretty darn good.
Keith made a cheesecake and it was amazing! He mixed the cheese cake mix with peanut butter, a smashed banana, and 80% cocoa bar grounds : D
This is Marilyn and Dennis' beautiful home in Winnipeg.
Marilyn sending us off
Winnipeg had beautiful residential streets with beautiful tall old trees and old stucco homes that are really nicely kept-- it was quite lovely!
The first night after leaving Winnipeg (we had gone basically straight North on a smaller road system that would meet up later that week with the main highway to Saskatoon) we were in a tiny town called Oak Point. At the local cafe, we were told it would be alright to camp in the park just outside. It was perfect and we made some friends--Dustin and his American Bulldog. Dustin was a really cool kid-- told us a lot about the area, asked a lot about our gear and logistics, and just hung out with us the rest of the evening.
Nice little set up...
I have Never seen as many spiderwebs as we saw that next morning! They were everywhere!! All over the short grass and big webs slung between basically every set of tall reeds. I wondered why we saw this SO much this morning and not anywhere else on our whole trip... It's a spidery place I guess!
This part of Manitoba has a rich Icelandic heritage--tons of immigrants came to farm here in the 1800s. Some towns along this road are Gimli, Vogur, and Rekjavik--Icelandic names. We saw this old barn from the road and because we could see right away that it was built in the icelandic way (it looks just like the ones we saw all over Iceland when we were there) we had to go take a closer look.
The sign above the door says "CHRIST DIED FOR OUR SINS"
The inside was constructed Just the same way we saw in Iceland as well!
We decided to make our lunch in there. Here's Keith cooking our Mac & Cheese in this old Icelandic barn in Manitoba... Pretty light, eh?
Old bridle piece
Old braided rope like we saw in Iceland... I know, lots of pictures... this was just exciting to us.
Our faithful steed, patiently waiting outside.
The road through what is called "the Narrows" was really neat. The road turns into just a causeway that stretches through the lake system (currently very flooded). So all day on this road we were entertained by watching tons of ducks and frogs and hearing big splashes in the water from a mystery animal we could never catch sight of. I loved these reed reflections--just looked like an artist's ink scratches on a paper of blue and white.
The causeway
"The bicycle gang of Lake Manitoba"-- these kids met up with us at a gas station we stopped at (the only place to get drinking water for miles and miles) on the First Nations reservation they live on. They were way cool--biked with us a few miles down the road. Everyone we saw was on a bike in this village! We talked bikes for a while and they told us more about the flood--how their homes had been totally flooded-- and about their town, we had a good time.
Tons of pelicans here. I saw these ones from a distance, but actually there were about 20 more that were in the water really close to the road that we startled as we got near and they all flew/ speed-swam out from behind the bank and totally startled us. Not everyday you see cows and pelicans enjoying a watering hole together.
That's a fence in the water--another farmer's land totally covered by the overflow of the lake. You see, upstream, politicians decided to open up the dams and let the water out of the reservoirs (they had gotten way more rain than normal this season) not realizing the water had no extra drainage from the lake below... tons of houses and acres and acres of farmland have been flooded (lots of hay crops ruined). We saw whole roads and farms underwater with ducklings paddling around what's supposed to be pastureland. Teams of workers (including Dustin, that boy we made friends with in Oak Point) are now building a dike all around the lake and saving the homes and buildings they can.
There were HUNDREDS of leopard frogs we saw on this one part of the road--they were happy!
We joked about how we could set out tent up on the flat side of one of the hay bales-- I went to go measure to see if we could lay down and sleep on top of one. I could!
We had to take a picture with the sign for the road to Rekjavik! The town was a few miles off the main road (if there is any town left) and the road was closed anyway, so we didn't try to go in to it.
We camped in somebody's hay field that night--it was nice! Tons of coyotes howling and yipping that night pretty close to where we were, pretty neat!
We found this nice wire basket on the road and strapped it on our bike as a little carrier for odd and ends (mostly groceries). It has been really handy since!
We have seen lots of neat skies. The yellow is Canola.
Keith caught another little leopard frog where we camped in a little town called Gilbert Plains.
We camped in a public park right smack in (and wide open to) the middle of town. One concerned citizen informed us it wasn't allowed and recommended we pack up and move because the authorities would surely come. Since we were already in our bags sleeping at that point, we didn't take his recommendation. No authorities came.
The ride between Gilbert Plains, Manitoba and Yorkton, Saskatchewan that next day was one of my favorite stretches so far--it was beautiful, with rolling hills, deciduous and evergreen trees, tons of red-tailed hawks, and old old homestead farm houses--finally, there was contrast in the landscape again.
Old homestead valley
