New Province!

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The drive out of Ontario was the best part of the drive. That whole area from just before Thunder Bay to the border was the nicest we've been through yet. Forests to open lakes to huge walls of rocks...we were rubbernecking the whole way. There was an hour or two where we saw NOBODY going the same direction as us, and few cars going the opposite way and absolutely no civilization on either side besides logging activity. Also, the radio stations were few and far between. We went a little crazy.

We stopped for food in Ignace at a small burger stand, after which point traffic picked up. I'm not sure how that works out or where they all suddenly came from.

Dryden was perhaps the most interesting town so far. They had this wierd propaganda radio station which listed off places we should go if we needed assistance and detailed directions on how to get there. After about 10 minutes it suddenly cut out and we didn't hear it again. Very strange though. We caught a quick picture of Morris, the big plastic moose. I'm getting better.

Leaving ontario wasn't anything compared to entering Manitoba. We stopped at the info station to pick up a few brochures. While we were there I looked at the cyclist log, where cyclists can enter their start and end points, and their country of origin and a comment or two. I was surprised at how many people bike across the country. People from Japan, Germany, Finland, etc, all biking across Canada, most of which complained about the lack of a good wind and commented on how lovely the country is. I feel bad for driving now.

Anyway, Manitoba started out much the same way Ontario ended, rocky and foresty. The highway speed picked up 100 kph which was nice, but we ended up driving slower than we did in Ontario since we saw three cops in the first 20 minutes and didn't want a ticket in another province. I guess it's a good place to fill up your quota if you're a traffic cop. Good for them.

We missed the turnoff for Whiteshell park so we're going to go there on the way back. I was surprised at how many provincial parks they had at the beginning of Manitoba, huge tracts of land on either side of the highway. Then it got flat. I guess most of the province was farmed up long ago except for these rocky bits at the beginning so it only made sense to turn them into parks or something. The flat was something to see though. We saw a few neat lines of planted trees here and there which broke up the horizon minutely but not much else besides. It was sunny and pastoral so we took a few pics and zoned out.

Winnipeg is really nice. Hardly any garbage. Today is National Aboriginal day so there were piles of people out walking, and we got the last hotel room at the Best Western downtown. We had a walk down to the legislative buildings, which are beautiful, down across the Assiniboine river, which was very high and flooding the riverside paths, and into Osborne village, where we had delicious sushi for dinner. On the walk back, we went on the other side of the legislative buildings and saw the gardens there, which were small but nice. They had several different varieties of roses growing, which were beautiful.

We walked back to the hotel, and fell asleep to theTV. Oh, civilization.

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[Linda (Mom)]

Car Rental
I tried to get Discount on phone but was on hold forever as it was after business hours here (eventually hung up). I will give you the phone #, as you will probably need to give them info I don't have at hand. Pembroke # is 613 735-7860 ( I think that the numbers all go to central dispatch anyway). Let me know what happens. Mom F. P.S. I sent Grandma Fraser the link for the Blog.