Big Sky - Manitoba and Saskatchewan

I've heard Montana, south of here, described as Big Sky country, but from my experience Manitoba and Saskatchewan beat it hands down. The journey today is characterized with fields of crops on either side and the big, big blue sky ahead (Oh and long, long trains).

Big Sky - Manitoba

A huge Train and a lovely sky

The open road and a delightful Sky

Our route today is another simple one:

Winnipeg to Regina - Trans-Canada Highway (Point and Click)

Breakfast

It was 4.00am when I woke this morning feeling bright and refreshed. I wrote a blog post and loaded photos, though the connection speed was not great. Downloads are superfast, but uploads go at a snail's pace. 

As usual Drew woke at 5.00am and I made him and myself a coffee. This hotel has a single cup coffee machine which takes a little longer than the more traditional style which gurgles away on its own until the pot is full. 

We went down to Breakfast at 7.00am and we had what we have now come to expect from Quality/Comfort Inn breakfasts. There were lovely sausages and well cooked scrambled eggs with orange juice and coffee. 

Breakfast at the Quality Inn and Suites, Winnipeg

The Journey 

We departed the hotel at 7.45am and bought petrol at the Esso Station less than a mile away down the road.  

Google Maps (when we were at the hotel) had told me that there had been an accident on the MB1, the Trans-Canada Highway, so we got Google to route us a different route out of town. Which we followed. This took us through some quiet suburban streets with bungalows that wouldn't be out of place in the UK. 

We followed the MB100 through Headingley and came to the MB1 on the other side of the accident. 

The temperature was 55F when we left the hotel and it stayed at this level until 11.00am when it began to warm up. 

The MB1, here in Manitoba the Trans-Canada Highway, is a dual-carriageway with the highest speed limit we have encountered in Canada - 110km (near 70mph). This is a lovely surprise as the journey would seem long at a slower speed.

The road stretches on in the distance and while Oregon was characterized by lakes and trees, Manitoba is one large Prairie. The fields are only broken up by occasional homes and large numbers of grain silos. 

The Fields and Sky of Manitoba

As we passed the town of Portage de Prairie we saw two enormous trains passing each other for miles and miles. Only yesterday we had wondered why large trucks are far less evident on the roads of Canada than they are in the US. It is clear now what the answer is, most freight travels by rail. 

We continued along the road for 2.25 hours singing 'Home on the Range' which, though set in the American Prairies to the south, seems apt for here too. 

We stopped in Brandon at 10:00am and I had a Four Cheese Bagel with cream cheese, wondering if that made it a five cheese bagel? Drew decided to try some Timbits, the odd mini donuts for which Tim Hortons is famous. He had raspberry, honey, apple and birthday cake flavours. 

<<Co-Pilot's note: 

I am intrigued by the concept of a Timbit. While I have no issue on principle with them, as they are just small bits of donut, in practice I am puzzled by them producing donut dough in normal qualities and then cutting them so small. Why did the company make them sound like I am eating bits of a deceased Canadian Hockey player, bits of Tim, rather than bits of dough.>>

Still all four he tried were very tasty. 

Bagel and Four Timbits

After Tim Hortons Drew took over the driving as we left Brandon at 10.40 for the journey towards Saskatchewan. 

We cross into Saskatchewan at Midday, which becomes 11.00am as Saskatchewan does not use Summer time. So is in the same time zone as Manitoba in the winter and as Alberta in the Summer!! Could get confusing if you lived near the province border I guess.

The SK1 bares a remarkable resemblance to the MB1. Few vehicles on a dual carriageway with views of endless fields and big blue skies all around. 

This is broken up only by the occasional homestead and corn silos. 

We became a bit excited when a lake (or possibly a farmer's reservoir) appeared among the crops. 

A Lake or Reservoir in Saskatchewan

We past Whitewood, a very small town and came to Grenfell where we changed drivers again at a Petrol Station with a food store. 

As the passenger Drew spotted the front of a train, the ones we had seen earlier were huge, so seeing the front he decided to count the carriages as they went past. There were 187 carriages (plus or minus five) about half of which were doubled up (one on top of another), an amazing site along the prairie. 

Lots of white butterflies flew across the road ahead. Many of them being scooped up by the car which now has them all over the windscreen and grille. The car looks like a butterfly killing machine. 

Realising, with the extra hour, that we would be coming to Regina very early we decided to visit the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Training Depot (and exhibition centre). This involves driving past our hotel, but as the RCMP Depot was a bit out of town we decided to visit before parking up for the day at the hotel. 

Royal Canadian Mounted Police

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police began as the Northwest Mounted Police in 1873 (getting the Royal added to their title in 1904) when the three prairie provinces (Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta) with the current territories of the Yukon and Nunavut were all parts of the Northern Territories as well as the area that continues to have that name. This was a huge area and, at the time, included large populations of First Nation people. They have a good history section on their website as well as at the heritage centre.

Main Building and Parade Ground - RCMP Depot Division

So, for example, it was one of the 'Mounties' (Major James M. Walsh) who ensured the peace with Sitting Bull when he led his people into Canada after the defeat of Custer at the Battle of the Little Bighorn.

Depot Division, where we are, remains the place where all 'Mounties' come to do their basic training. So young men and women from all over Canada come for six months, away from family and friends, to undergo the preparation for their life in the 'Mounties'. Thus in this afternoon we see both the exhibition and history of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the details of their current role in Canadian society. In the time since their foundation they have moved from a para-military force keeping order in the wild lands to a police force with Federal policing duties in Canada and with local police responsibility in some of the provinces and all of the territories. 

The exhibition and history was fascinating, and we had the opportunity to go onto the training grounds to see the buildings used by the new recruits and see some of them in action undertaking crime scene scenarios as part of their training (naturally this latter part could not be photographed.) If you ever travel to Regina I would strongly recommend a visit to the RCMP Heritage Centre. We spent two fascinating hours here and had some fun.

Mountie Drew

Hotel

From the RCMP we drove the three miles back into Regina and checked into our hotel - the Quality Hotel - at 5.00pm. Unlike most of the places we have stayed this holiday, which have been two storied, or three at most, this hotel was a seven story building and we were in Room 707. The room was comfortable, but the hotel feels slightly dated, with modern features we have seen elsewhere missing from the hotel. <<Co-pilot's note: Think, dear readers, of the hotel in The Shining.>>  

Come play with me Danny

We spent thirty minutes there before heading out into Regina

Regina

Regina is a much smaller City than Winnipeg (a population 216k compared with 710k) and it feels it. Everything is closer together which means Regina is an easy City to walk around.

Though small Regina is the Provincial Capital of Saskatchewan, so we began our tour with a walk to the Saskatchewan Legislative Assembly which was a mile and a half from the hotel. 

The Legislative Assembly building is in a wonderful setting of Wascana Park this large open area, with a big lake at its centre, clearly attracts the people of Regina for walks, cycling, roller-boarding etc. We walked past the Royal Saskatchewan Museum, which was just closing and on to the grounds of the Assembly. The building is made of Manitoba stone, there being hardly any hills, let alone stone quarries, in Saskatchewan. Therefore the building bears a close resemblance to the Manitoba equivalent I spoke of in my last post.

The Saskatchewan Legislative Assembly building from Wascana Park

Given the name Regina, and that it was founded after the death of Queen Victoria, the current Queen, Queen Elizabeth the Second, is very prominent in statues and plaques around the grounds. 

Queen Elizabeth on her horse outside the Saskatchewan Assembly Building

Another interesting feature of the area was a First Nation PowWow which takes places this week in August each year.

First Nation PowWow - Began yesterday

We walked back into the town centre and to City Hall, which has a lovely memorial to the immigrants of Canada in the park in front. This gave me time to remember all those who came to this land and gave of their sweat and tears to set up a new life. My Grandfather, my mother's father, was a reverse immigrant, coming from Australia to Wales in the 1920s but I know many people who have family who came here, or to Australia at the time the 'colonies' were being populated and for many of them it was not an easy life. My friend Kath Ringwald has been telling me about the lives of her deceased husband's family (John 1, as she is now together with another John). I'm sure she won't mind me sharing her words:

When John 1’s great uncle and his brother in law left the UK for Canada in 1910, they headed to Winnipeg, attracted by it’s whimsical name. They arrived there in October and soon found work as labourers on the expanding railroad. It turned out to be one of the worst winters in living record at that time. They wrote home of the freezing conditions, huge snowdrifts and shortage of fuel. As soon as Spring began they caught the first train to Vancouver and it’s milder climate, vowing never to return to Winnipeg. Their families followed them to Vancouver and the rest, as they say, is history. John’s great uncle David never swore, except to refer to ‘bloody Winnipeg’.

Immigrants' Memorial 

Regina City Hall

Next to City Hall is Victoria Park with its cenotaph and other statues of historical Canadian figures including the first Prime Minister of Canada. 

Cenotaph - Regina

John MacDonald - Canada's First Prime Minister

Dinner

Now we were back in downtown we looked for somewhere to eat. Unlike Winnipeg, whose size leads to a large foodie culture downtown, Regina had a limited range on offer. We passed a Thai restaurant called Siam. It google rating was very high so, as people who eat Thai a lot at home, we decided it was time to taste our first Canadian Thai, and we were glad we did.

Our starters were vegetable spring rolls, miang kham and por pia sod, the later being more commonly transliterated as bor bia in the UK. The Miang Kham, a favorite  of ours at home, was as good here as the ones at the Thai House. The spring rolls were rich and tasty, the biggest surprise came with the por pia, which were dumplings, as we know, but instead of small packages they were two dumpling rolls. The flavours and textures were what we would expect, but the presentation very different. They still tasted great.

Vegetable spring rolls

Miang Kham

Por Pia Sod

For mains we shared nuae pad prik, larb moo and kaprow gai which were all served with a generous portion of steamed rice. The waitress asked how we liked our larb moo, and we both replied hot. She then asked Canadian hot or Thai hot, we said the latter of course and she just checked that we knew what she meant. In the end, though they were chilli rich none of the dishes would have been what we would call very hot. But that may just be us.

Nuae Pad Prik

Kaprow Gai 

Steamed Rice in a decorative bowl

Larb Moo - Yummy

We walked the 0.2 of a mile to the hotel and got back at 9.30  and to bed by 10.30pm. The end of another lovely day.