Regina to Val Marie

Today had so many surprises, I don’t know quite where to start.

Our goal was to reach Grasslands National Park, and go exploring in a national park we would not otherwise see.

Did we get to explore!

Our route took us directly south of Regina, where to my surprise we ran into some badlands style landscape.  The farmlands evolved into dry hilly places with things like the occasional slough and salt flat.

As a side comment, the whole area is ruled by agriculture, whether it be grain production, hay, or grazing.

I found a flax field going into bloom, but not quite at its height of colour.  When all the blue flowers are out, the field looks like a silvery field of water—just gorgeous.

Grain storage has evolved considerably.  It was difficult to find old grain elevators, since most have been torn down for safety reasons.  Grains are now stored in metal silos.

I had noticed that a lot of truck rigs here carried not one, but two 16-wheeled trailers.  Some trailers looked like an upside down triangle with a small flat spot at the apex, and I thought they were gravel haulers (like in Ontario).  No, they were grain haulers, built to deposit grain down a chute to be then lifted into a silo. 

I did find an old and new technology site, but even there was a difference where the grain elevator was now clad in metal from top to bottom.

As we moved west along the southern part of Saskatchewan farms evolved into huge properties, appropriately named as ranches (eg Six Mile Ranch) where you couldn’t tell where one ownership ended and the next began.  Crops started giving way to grazing, stock yards and feed lots, and huge accumulations of hay.

Saskatchewan farmers are frugal.  I thought they had inadvertently dropped a roll of hay in the ditch, but then learned they had been harvesting the 20’ ditch for more feed.

Our road was now a narrow two-lane, two-direction road with no shoulders and a steep drop-off into the grassy ditch (as above).  The only traffic encounters happened four times where we met oncoming huge farming machinery, often 20 feet across at minimum.

Old tractors were often left in the middle of the field, almost as an ornament.

We passed through almost no signs of human habitation, and when we did see a structure, it was most often abandoned.

Nonetheless, we stopped for a Kodak moment and immediately a farmer pulled over to ask us if we needed help or directions.

There were lots of signs of different flora and fauna.

There are three kinds of native sunflowers here, and they were striking additions to the ditch horticulture.

Rodents are everywhere (prairie dogs, gophers and ground squirrels).

We also ran into some mule deer, and began to appreciate the harvested ditches, where the deer were less likely to hide and jump out at you.

Our goal of visiting Grasslands Park began to diminish when we hit the entrance road to the east block of the park at 3:00 pm, and found there was still 150 km to go before we found the entrance to the west side of the park.

We had booked a room at Val Marie (west end) and decided to forge on until we got there, and visit the park tomorrow.

Weather was interesting today, for we dodged rain cells but saw tremendous clouds.  I had forgotten that in the midst of a prairie rain, the temperature will drop 4-6C in practically seconds.

Our B&B tonight is called the Convent Inn, mostly because it had been a convent.  Brian was interested because he claimed all his old girlfriends hang out in places like this. 

Val Marie claims to have a population of 137.  There is a hotel in town where we ate dinner, and in the fine tradition of the prairies, it was a Chinese restaurant.

I will add one last little story.

We were sitting having breakfast at the hotel restaurant this morning, when an Asian woman brought in an infant and her 5-year old son to say thanks to the restaurant staff. Something was said, and the waitress teased the boy about forgetting a lot of things this day. Whereupon, with a large grin on his face, he announced, "I left my brains in the garbage this morning!"  This sounds like an excellent line for the future.