Canadian Roadtrip Art Project: Manitoba and the Rest of the West...

July 31
After our great breakfast at Upsala, we carried on to Ignace to fuel up and then we headed for Dryden which is a fairly big city. Onwards along the Trans-Canada through Kenora and then we crossed into Manitoba. It's kind of funny but almost as soon as you cross into Manitoba, the terrain changes - not sure if this was by design when they were drawing the provincial boundaries or not but as soon as we were in Manitoba, the ground became much more arable and cultivated. It also starts to open up and very quickly, you leave the hilly country and come down into the beginning of the Canadian prairies.
One of the things we really wanted to do was go to Steinbach, Manitoba. My husband is a blacksmith and he was very interested in seeing what some of the Mennonite folks are doing. Steinbach has their "Mennonite Heritage Village Museum" which makes the grade as one of the top destinations in the province. Boy are we glad we went!
From Route 1, we headed south for only about 20 kms and by now, we were in wide open prairie. It had been a beautiful day today, sunny and warm and easy riding. We snagged a motel room (YAY!), had dinner and CRASHED. Turned out neither of us had much sleep the night before and we were beat. Who says money can't buy you happiness? Guaranteed, I was one VERY happy camper in our comfy, bug-free motel room, complete with an awesome shower! Ha ha ha...

August 1
We spent some time this morning taking care of planning details - booking appointments with the Harley dealership in Calgary for some maintenance when we get there in a few days, getting in touch with my sister to see them for awhile there as well, calling our kids to say hello, doing some online banking etc. We had a quick breakfast and then headed across the road to the Mennonite Heritage Village Museum.
When we arrived, Nita met us at the desk and gave us a great primer on the Mennonite community, some of their history and a bit of an orientation of what we would see in the park. Given that we aren't Mennonite and really don't know the first thing about them, I'm sure we asked some pretty uninformed questions but Nita was great! She really took the time to educate us both on the history and on her own personal experience growing up in a very traditional Mennonite community.
First we wandered through their fantastic museum which explains the history of the Mennonites and how it came to be that they separated from the Catholic church back in the early 1500s, following the initial protestant reformation. Menno Simons was, in fact, a catholic priest who was disillusioned with many aspects of the Catholic church and he, and his followers, established what would become the Mennonite community. Jacob Hutter split off with some of his followers a short time later and established the Hutterite community. Later, in the late 1600s, Jakob Ammann split off and established the Amish Community and by the early 1700s, another offshoot group established themselves as The Brethren. Interesting stuff. Boy, a sad history of persecution leading many of these folks to flee to all points on the globe, all because they spoke out against the Catholic church and wanted to lead a quiet life of their own choosing. We sure learned a lot about some of our Canadian neighbours... it was VERY interesting. I LAUGHED in the museum at the little station where you can push a button and hear different phrases spoken in the low German dialect most of the Mennonite people speak. The recording played in German and then they gave the English translation and one of them was, "Don't let your heart slip too quickly into your pants."!!! HA HA HA... Great sense of humour! There was another funny one too but I can't recall it at the moment... (Nita, if you read this and remember it, email me and I'll add it!)
The park itself is basically a re-creation of a typical Mennonite village that they would build because the village design was very efficient for largely communal living. They have a main street with a post office, shops and stores as well as a blacksmith shop etc. There are homes, barns, a sawmill, a windmill, big shops for farm equipment etc., communal gardens and livestock pens and paddocks. They also have a "worship house" (not called a church) and schools. This particular park is very well done and they have interpreters throughout the park as well as about 40 stores and services. Lots to see. Plan on staying for a day.
The windmill is particularly awesome. It's a reproduction built in 2001 to replace the one that was burned down by arsonists in 2000. It's a fully functioning windmill and the community grinds their grain into flour there which you can buy and which they bake their bread with in the restaurant.
A MUST DO in the park is having lunch at the Livery Barn Restaurant. For $12, you can get the "Traditional" - a feast of homemade bread, a bowl of borscht, a plate of homemade perogies with a cheese sauce, a homemade pork sausage, cabbage salad and a lovely rhubarb cake for dessert. One of the best meals we had. We thoroughly enjoyed our day here and would highly recommend this great place to visit.
We hung out in Steinbach until about 3pm and then headed out again with the intent of getting into Saskatchewan but we packed it in in Elkhorn, a small town just 20kms before the border. We found a municipal campsite there, beside the graveyard and fairgrounds. A nice, clean campsite with free showers, all for $15.

Mennonite Heritage Village Museum

Just South of Moose Jaw

August 2
We crossed into Saskatchewan and had breakfast in Moosomin. From there, we skirted Regina to Moose Jaw and then took Route 2 down to Gravelbourg. Some of my mother's family were homesteaders here back in the 1800s and were one of the founding families in the town of Gravelbourg. I wanted to come back here as the last time I was here was for a L'Heureux family reunion and, as luck would have it, it was 30 years ago almost to the day... weird in a synchronistic sort of way...
We arrived and went straight to the cathedral because it's the building Gravelbourg is most famous for. Inside this particular church are beautiful murals reminiscent of the big European churches. Imagine our disappointment to arrive only to find signs stapled to the locked doors indicating that entrance could only be obtained by taking a guided tour which was organized through their local museum.
Huh? The museum? This is still a church... right?
We wandered around and ended up chatting with a local person who explained the situation. The church is now locked all the time except if you're on a guided tour which you have to pay $10 for or if you come for mass on Sunday, "and you get dinged then too when they pass the basket around" they said wryly. This person said that a lot of local people are really upset by this and many are attending different churches as a result. It seems, they said, to always be about the money and we noted the new roof going up. We were also warned that the person who did the tours is notoriously rude and inflexible. There have already been several complaints made to both the city and the church about the matter by people who've come to visit like we had.
We went back to our bikes and were about to leave when another tourist we'd been talking to swung by and said, sotto voce, that the side door was unlocked. Hot dog! I really wanted to show my husband this church because of it's significance to my family history. We'd just come into the church when all of a sudden, the "tour guy" showed up. He came up to us and immediately told us the church should have been locked and that you can't be in here if you're not on a tour. Fortunately, I'd been primed for him so I said, "Well, what time is the next tour?" to which he just shrugged. So then I said, "This is a church. It should always be open, shouldn't it?" and I proceeded in to look around. That's when he stomped off (and I do mean stomp) and slammed a door somewhere and you could hear him speaking very loudly to someone on the phone, no doubt railing on the poor summer student who had inadvertently left the door open. Pity that person!
By the time he came back, he was worked right up into a good old huff. Another couple had come into the church and he was telling them they needed to leave as well. I approached and told him that this was categorically wrong and that I was going to write to the Archdiocese office. I said that this is a house of God, not a tourist attraction like Disneyland (for heaven's sake!) and that people should be able to come into the church without having to pay and should be able to be here without getting major attitude from the likes of him! We've been all over Italy and not one church was ever been locked (unless closed for renos) nor do you have to pay to come in, including St. Peter's Basilica at the Vatican! You can pay for a guided tour but anyone can enter for free. Anyway, the other couple looked as confounded as I was. The "tour guy" was unspeakably arrogant, rude, loud and attempting to be intimidating (which didn't work).
We left the church and I called my mother because I couldn't believe what had happened. She was equally blown away buy such utter codswallop... we're both writing letters to the church and the Gravelbourg newspaper. Unbelievable. My recommendation? Skip Gravelbourg's church. It's lovely but I am vehemently opposed to having to pay to go into a church and certainly to being treated with staggering disrespect. There are a lot of other lovely churches to see in this world and you won't get dinged $10 and have to deal with their gem of a "tour guide". To the decision-makers for the Gravelbourg cathedral I say, "Poor show! You're driving people AWAY in disgust. Kind of anathema to the teachings of the church, isn't it??" I'm sure my ancestors who helped build the church are rolling in their Gravelbourg graves right now...
So, we headed over to see them. We went to the Gravelbourg cemetery and found our family plots. It was particularly moving to see my Great Grandparent's grave (Napoleon and Marie-Anne L'Heureux) and my Great Great Grandfather Alexander L'Heureux's grave. We had intended on staying the night in a B&B in Gravelbourg but after the utterly crappy event at the church, we just wanted to get out of town.... too bad.
What struck me was the incredibly diametrically opposed experiences we'd had in the past 2 days. In Steinbach, we were met with incredibly warm, open arms at the Mennonite village by people so happy we would take an interest in their faith, culture and history. They generously shared their time and knowledge with us and we're not even part of their community - just visiting tourists. Then, today, I arrive in a town my own family helped establish almost 150 years ago and I'm literally "shooed" out of the church my family helped build which you now have to PAY to go into (!!) by an incredibly rude "tour guide".
I'm not a religious person by a long stretch but the irony was not lost on me that good old Father Menno Simons left the Catholic church (for a lot of really good reasons) over 500 years ago and my experience today in Gravelbourg would probably just make him raise his eyebrows all over again and say, "See? That's EXACTLY what I've been talking about!"
Gotta say, I'm definitely with the Mennonites on this one.

August 3
We stayed in Swift Current last night - we got in late and, as we came into town, I noticed a campsite right off the highway. We doubled back and took the turn off and were immediately enshrouded in a dense cloud of mosquitoes!!! I looked at my husband in panic and mouthed the word "Mosquitos!!" and he shook his head. He pulled up beside me and said, "No - those aren't mosquitos - they're different bugs. We have them at home and they don't bite..." "The hell they don't!" I said as we pulled into the campsite office area. A woman came out and I asked her if these were mosquitos (because the dense cloud had now risen up about 15 feet into the air above me and were a little harder to see) and she looked at me like I was crazy and said, "Yeeeesss..." at which point I said, "I'm sorry, I can't stay here..." and then she made a really yucky face at me and shooed me off!!! I was shooed off twice today!!! Can you believe that???
What the hell??? We only met two rude people on our ENTIRE trip and one was in Gravelbourg and one was in Swift Current (sorry to the friendly folks in Saskatchewan!) and both were on the same day! And for the record, it wasn't me... I even asked my husband, "Am I bringing this on in some way??" Nope.
Anyway, I looked at my husband and said, "No freaking way!" and we pulled out and immediately checked into the Comfort Inn...
This morning, we headed out into a beautiful day. I was determined to leave the crappiness of rude people behind us. I have to say, we REALLY enjoyed our ride through the prairies. All of the canola is in bloom here and the smell is HEAVENLY!! Vast carpets of lemon yellow in between fields of ripening wheat. Gorgeous. There were also a few big fields of alfalfa in bloom which were carpets of bluey-purple. Stunning. Lots of little towns along the way and LOTS of wide open sky. I had great opportunity to study the sky and the clouds in particular and how I would paint them. My spirits were lifted...
We crossed into Alberta and came through Medicine Hat, Brooks, Bassano, Strathmore, Chestermere and into Calgary, arriving at my sister's place around 5:00. A GREAT day. Alberta was equally stunning as we made our way into the Badlands and the terrain became more hilly. Beautiful coulees and rolling farm and ranch land as far as the eye can see. We also saw some more oil rigs bobbing up and down like birds in the fields which we haven't seen since we came across Montana and North Dakota 6 weeks ago...
It was so great to see my sister, my brother-in-law and my niece! We had dinner at the restaurant my niece works at - "4th Spot" - which was really good.
We also called my grandson, Wee Owen Henry, who isn't so Wee anymore - it was his 2nd birthday today. Happy Birthday Owen! XXOO from Grandma and Papa!

August 4
How lucky are we? My sister and her family spent the the entire day touring us around Calgary. We went and saw a number of different places in the city where the flooding had been so bad - some of the neighbourhoods, the Stampede grounds, parts of downtown and along the river. On the one hand, I can't believe how much work they've done in such a short time to get this city back on it's feet. It's incredible. On the other hand, I can't believe how much there still is to be done in some areas. We went up to the Olympic Park and saw where you can zipline down the ski jump... CRAZY! We went to a GREAT place called the Mercato - a deli and restaurant owned by an Italian family who've been in the business for over 50 years. My sister and I were looking at their olive oil dispenser when the lady behind the counter spotted us and said hello. She was Mama Catarina - the owner. We had a great conversation in Italian (I don't get to use it much so it's always fun to have the chance) and we traded stories about Italy and what parts of the country our respective families are from (they're from Calabrese, we're from just outside Rome and Venice). We had an instant rapport and Mama Catarina gave us big hugs and double cheek-kisses and sent us on our way with a gift of free doughnuts she made. I sure wish their place was closer by! She told us they'd opened up a second store in the North end of the city so we drove up there and had lunch. It was awesome - the real deal. As good as any of the food we had in Italy. This is a BIG recommend.
Ciao, Mama Catarina! Grazie Mille!
After our city tour, we went home and had a fantastic BBQ. Great day with family... Thanks Vicky, Chris and Maddie!

Calgary, Alberta

August 5
Drove downtown to the Harley dealership only to find out they'd booked us appointments for 8:30 on a long weekend Monday and they're not open until 10:00. Oops. Luckily, they have a little cafe that opened at 9:00 so we had breakfast and waited until they opened. They got us in and out by 11:00 so that was good and then we met up with some good friends (and old business partners of my husbands) the Harvies. Tim brought us on a tour of part of the Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park that his family established. Incredibly beautiful and if you live in the Calgary/Cochrane area, you really must spend some time there. What a legacy the Harvie family has created for the people of, and the visitors to, Alberta. We met up in Cochrane with some more of the Harvie family and friends after our tour and had a great visit. Sigh... too many miles to go and not enough time. We tore ourselves away at 5:00 with lots of promises to come back soon when we can stay for awhile... Cochrane is an incredibly beautiful area with a pretty little town center and then rolling farms and ranchland in the surrounding hills.
From there we headed towards Banff and found a decent campsite.

August 6
General thoughts this morning - I'm a little on the fence about the whole idea of having to pay to get into our National Parks. Part of me seriously feels like we pay enough, as citizens of our provinces and citizens of this country, in our taxes that we shouldn't have to pay to see parts of our own country. On the other hand, I realize that everyone needs funding these days to keep things running, especially with a federal government that has utter disregard for the legacy it will leave for our future generations by way of parks, arts culture etc. Sigh...
We've paid a pile of dough to get into Parks Canada sites across this country. You CAN get a season's pass but they don't come cheap and on our trip, we weren't sure how many we'd see because we were on such a loose itinerary. Anyway, we made our final payment to "The Man" heading into Banff and then we went to the village to have breakfast. Boy were we glad to get there on the Tuesday of the long weekend and not the day before. The detritus from the holiday shenanigans was all over the streets and cleaners were diligently out there getting everything in tip top shape. We spoke with one shop owner and he said they set record numbers in the park this past weekend. Good for them - especially after the losses everyone incurred from the flooding in June.
Banff village is lovely - it's pretty much another Whistler although Banff came first. Lots of kitschy little shops selling made-in-China souvenirs with bears and wolves and beavers on them. No end of that stuff, actually... and then lots of top end shops including a Hudson's Bay company outlet with all the classic striped stuff going for a king's ransom. The town is nestled deep in the valley between staggeringly big and beautiful mountain peaks that dropped the jaw of even this Kootenay girl... I guess this is why I feel ambivalent about having to pay to get in here. This shouldn't become an elitist experience... As Canadians, we should all be able to come and see these sights and I can't help but think of the thousands of low-income families who wouldn't be able to afford even the park fees.
Anyway, part of me was spellbound by the spectacular magnificence and part of me wept somewhere inside at how cliche and fabricated for tourism it's become. ..
We carried on down the road to Lake Louise and Lord A'mighty... we were in for a shock. We started to head up the road and the traffic became all backed up to a full stop. Hmmm, we thought. Must be an accident or something up ahead. Nope... that's just the slammin' high season rush hour that lasts all day on a Tuesday to get in there. A sign of things to come...
We get into Lake Louise and you can hardly move for the people. The parking lots are full already (by 10:00) and the overflow lots are starting to fill up too. The GINORMOUS Lake Louise Fairmont Hotel is massive and packed to the rafters. Tour buses are filing in in line ups and tourists (including us) are milling around like ants at a picnic. We made our way to the actual lake which you can't see until you get in front of the hotel because it takes up the entire view of that end of the valley.
Truly, the view is spectacular. The lake is that milky aquamarine blue of glacier fed lakes and on either side is a stunning mountain. On the other far end of the lake is another dazzling mountain cradling a roiling glacier like an offering to those of us who have made the trek. Wow. On the lake were a flock of red canoes - you can rent them to paddle around in - and about 6000 people along the shoreline, posing for pictures. Again, another ambivalent experience for me - part of me is truly in awe of the beauty and part of me is sad that the remote wilderness experience will never be had again in this area.
We continued up the Icefields Road - just past Lake Louise, you take Route 93 heading towards Jasper. What a truly magnificent ride. We've seen a lot of this country in the past 7 weeks including the Gaspe Peninsula and the Cabot Trail on Cape Breton, two of the most popular driving routes in Canada and I have to say, they don't compare to this road for sheer mind-boggling beauty. Every turn in the road is a postcard vista with stunning mountain ranges and peaks that reach for the sky. As we head north, we start to see more glaciers hugging the sides and tops of mountains like weather beaten blue-white hide...
NOTE TO TRAVELERS - DO NOT buy gas at Saskatchewan River Crossing if you can at all avoid it. Fuel up in Lake Louise and bring a gerry can if you need it. We paid $1.72/liter. Hands down the most expensive gas on our entire trip. Before this, the highest was in Quebec at $1.54. The cheapest in Canada was Calgary at $1.14 and the cheapest on the whole trip was in the States (on average, about 1/3 less than in Canada). Anyway, Saskatchewan River Crossing is a total gouge... another sign of things to come...
Just past here, you leave Banff National Park and enter Jasper National Park (no, you don't have to pay again - your park permit is good for both Banff and Jasper) and shortly after coming into Jasper National Park, you arrive at the Columbia Ice Fields. I was pretty excited to see them. I've seen photos and I'm aware of how incredible they are so I was stoked. We got there and yes, it is stop-in-your-tracks unbelievable. The famous Athabasca Glacier sits like a God-like monument, gently sloping down towards the highway and the tourism building. On the glacier, microscopic-sized people are hiking on the ice and further up, specially built monster tour buses take people out on a road onto the glacier.
We went in to inquire. Fifty bucks a person to take the monster bus out onto the ice for a look around on a one hour tour. That seemed steep to us so we decided to just go for a coffee and sit out on the deck that looks out over the glaciers. $9.71 for a watered down coffee, an equally watery hot chocolate and a chocolate bar and the mugs were those tiny little 8 ounce jobbies! I was surprised they didn't charge us to sit out on their picnic tables! So we sat in the glorious sunshine and got at least $9.71 worth of enjoyment out of the view and left.

Proof!! About double what it should have been... :(

Holy gouge, batman. Don't tell me the sky high prices for everything here are because of remote location. The access is close and easy to Calgary and the roads are fantastic. The answer is short and simple - they gouge because they can.
Our recommendation? Pack a lunch. The drive is fantastic and the tourism building is free to get into to sit on their magnificent deck. They also have picnic tables alongside the parking lots with good views too. Visit the restaurant on pain of death to your pocketbook. As for the glacier tours? Well, if you've never walked on one, you might decide to because my guess is, within another 100 years or less, these will all be gone. They have a photo of what it looked like in 1844 and back then, the ice field was twice as big as it is now... so if that's worth $50 to you, go for it... (we were on glaciers in Alaska so we didn't feel the need.)
After leaving the Icefields, we stopped at one of our favorite sites on this stretch of road, the Athabasca River waterfalls. THIS site is free and they've done a fantastic job of putting in walking trails with secure retaining walls right alongside the best part of the falls so you can REALLY experience the power and beauty of them. We love love loved this! We walked all the trails and I took piles of pictures - I know at least one painting (if not more) will come out of this site. Totally awesome and worth taking the time to stop here.
By the time we left the Falls, it was starting to rain and not just any rain but the kind of rain you would expect in the middle of such huge mountainous country. It wasn't a downpour, it was an onslaught. We hustled as best we could down the last 30 kms into Jasper and as we rode, we saw signs for campsites and they were all full. By the time we got into Jasper, about half of the hotels were full (this was about 4:30pm) so we drove the strip and stopped at the Amethyst Hotel. They had 3 rooms left and the other two went in the time it took us to book ours. We were tired, soaked to the skin and there was nowhere to camp. I was so grateful for our room and we got upgraded to a suite! Nice!
Jasper seemed less overtly touristy than Banff and is smaller too. It's still a "town" and the main street still has nice "town" kinds of shops in among the more obvious tourist chachki stores. By the time we got settled, the rain had slowed so we wandered down the main street and found Jasper Pizzeria. It smelled great so we went in and low and behold, a wood-fired pizza oven. Things were definitely looking up. Every since we were in Italy, we've been on the hunt for the "real deal" kind of pizza in Canada as we found in Tuscany. So far, we've found only 3 that come close - Cupola's in San Francisco, Flatbread in Paia, Maui (neither of which are in Canada) but now we found Jasper Pizzeria!! And it's so much closer than San Fran or Maui!
Maybe it was because we were tired. Maybe it was because we were ravenous. Maybe it was because we were finally warm and dry... who knows but all I can tell you is the pizza and the lasagna we shared was absolutely heaven. They even have gluten-free! Put 5 stars beside this one - and it was very reasonably priced to boot considering we were right on the main street. Awesome.

August 7
Wow. Today's the day. By tonight, we'll be home and in our own beds. We can't believe it, actually. In some ways, it seems like the time has flown by at break-neck speed and in other ways, it seems like a year ago we left (Montana seems like a distant dream from some other trip...) It's been 50 days. Crazy.
We woke up to heavy fog but the weather report called for a fine day. We headed out to find the Jasper cemetery where my husband's father is buried with many of his family members (they were a big railway family in Jasper for years before his father moved out here to central BC to ranch). We found the gravesite and took some pictures and then headed out on the home stretch.
The ride out of the mountains, through Valemount and into Blue River is incredible... the mountains started to fan out, creating wider valley bottoms and more farms started to appear. The fog lifted and revealed a gloriously sunny day and almost instantly, it warmed up into the 80s. We stopped in Valemount for a break and peeled of layers of gear, it had warmed up so dramatically. Hard to believe I left Jasper in thermal underwear! (Underneath the rest of my clothes that is...)
This whole stretch of road follows the Thompson River which was big and swollen and it's typical silty brown. Fertile riverland offered up lots of hay fields and the smell of fresh cut hay was wonderful. We stopped for lunch at a little place we discovered last year called Rivermount Campsite and Cafe about 5 kms north of Little Fort. It's changed hands this year but the food is still just a great. After lunch we headed up Highway 24 into 100 Mile House and then home into Williams Lake and then Riske Creek. It was weird, after all of those miles, to be back in your own back yard. Hard to believe we'd gone all the way across the country to it's Eastern most point (Cape Spear) and then back again. We pulled into our yard and we could see our three dogs looking out towards us as we came down the drive, not believing (I'm sure) that it was really us. Suddenly, I could see their tails slowly start to wag and they exploded in a burst of jumping and running, wiggling and bumping their way down the drive to meet us. What a brilliant welcome home reception party! Lots of yowling, licking, barking and snorkeling...
We had finally arrived, 17,600 kms and 50 days later, safe and sound. A truly incredible trip of a lifetime...

Stay tuned... I will be continuing to update all of the blog posts with good photos from my big camera as I get them downloaded and organized so check the different posts for better pictures over the next few weeks. I will also be writing a couple "epilogue" entries on thoughts about our trip now that we're home and I've had a chance to mentally process it all - things like what we'd do again, what we'd do differently next time, things we learned (both the easy and the hard way!), some stats (gas consumption, costs, etc.) and some overall general thoughts. I hope to start the painting series this Fall and as I complete the paintings, I will post photos of the them here as well.

Thanks to all of you who have followed this blog! It's our first time blogging and it's been really fun for us to watch our blob stats and see how many people from all over the world have been following our journey. FYI, we've had people from Canada, the US, Russia, Germany, Netherlands, Mexico, China, Serbia, Poland, Iran, Spain, Morocco, Brazil, Malaysia, Thailand, Italy, England, France, Isreal, S. Korea, Ireland and Chile check us out regularly. We hope this blog helps you if you decide to come to this country and ride a motorcycle across it!

Athabasca Glacier at the Columbia Icefields