Let's Get Out of Canada!

Saskatoon:  David was so excited to go to Saskatoon, Saskatchewan because he loved the name.  BUT…we did not love Saskatoon.  It is a very blue collar city with almost nothing to do and the WORLD”S WORST CAMPGROUND!!!  We stayed in a city campground, but had to stay in overflow camping because the place was full.  That meant we were in an open field with parking lot-like slots and 2 outhouses that were almost overflowing…and then did overflow and were closed!  YUCK!!!!!  We went to a fringe festival and saw a street performer doing escape tricks and David made great contacts at the Golder office.   We were going to go to Winnipeg but the Golder folks told David that the office was basically a satellite of the Saskatoon office so we decided to leave Canada and head to North Dakota.  Great idea!! This is the only photo we took in the area! !The prairies we drove through were gorgeous and we learned about canola that was bright yellow and beautiful, although we were a bit late to enjoy the full blaze of yellow flowers. We also saw fields of sunflowers, but it was cloudy and we could not appreciate the full glory.

The one good thing about going to Saskatoon was the campground we stayed in before we arrived.  We saw a sign for a rest area and camping, which was very perplexing so we took the chance and made a little detour and found a wonderful $10.00 per night place run by volunteers from the village of Halfway, that was pretty, mostly empty and quiet!  What a surprise. Here is a view from the campground.

We drove to North Dakota (a state with even less population than AK) through the badlands.  Please note that the first time we drove through the badlands on the way to AK was the only time we had a great fight, resulting in my storming out of the car and David driving off, only to re-unite about an hour later and endure stony silence for many miles.  This trip, however, was glorious and we stayed for one night in Theodore Roosevelt National Park, North entrance and one night in the same park’s south entrance.  The North was very undeveloped and non-touristic and we loved it.  Fantastic scenery, great buffalo and QUIET. I am sitting on a rock formation called a "cannonball".  I wonder why?

We took a great, long hike off-trail in the north and had a very quiet night of camping.  This is a wonderful, totally unknown park and I hope none of you ever visit so it can stay as quiet as it was when we  stayed.  However, you can go to the North unit, which has a touristic little area in front of it and a much busier campground. That being said, the two hikes we went on were totally devoid of people and we loved them.    .  We saw lots of interesting wildlife including long horned cattle and ponies!    

and Wild turkeys in our campsite!

We remembered the time we were in Washington state and we took a short detour to go to the famous Ginko petrified forest, only to find bits of trees incarcerated behind bars along a winding interpretive path.

The petrified forest hike we took in Roosevelt was FABULOUS… a real forest of petrified trees lying about with no one around and nothing between us and the trees.  Really, really beautiful! 

We also visited a prairie dog community with no barriers between us and the little dogs, unlike other communities we had visited across the country that were behind fences posted with numerous signs with many rules. 

The main animal we saw at the Theodore Roosevelt Park was buffalo and we started taking photos of them as soon as we entered the park. Buffaloes standing, eating, sleeping.  Great fun to watch them from the car.  Then, we started seeing them near the campsite...and then they were in the campsite and we were on the camp road, waiting about an hour until they left our site, only to bed down in the field right behind our site.  They snore!!!!  Boy do they get big in ND!

We loved Theodore Roosevelt National Park, and were able to enter for free and camp for $5.00 on my “old lady” pass!!!!!

We left Theodore Roosevelt and went across ND to Fargo, a place we have always wanted to visit since we saw the Cohen brother’s eponymous movie.  What a great little place!!! made even better because we arrived on Sunday just at the time of the gay pride parade that was supported by all the major institutions of Fargo, including the hospital and police.  Go FARGO! 

We were quite blown away by the amount of oil wells, workers trailer camps and giant trucks on the highways in ND.  We had read about how the place was changing as a result of shale oil, but only seeing is believing and it is stunning how many trailer parks and temporary housing has grown up.  We even saw an oil well in the front yard of a small apartment complex!

Then we traveled to Minnesota and stayed the night camping off-road in a state forest that was wonderful because there was nobody around.  Then we left and tried to find a factory tour of Minetonka, in honor of the many moccasins that I have bought, only to find that the factory has moved to the Dominican Republic.

We arrived in Minneapolis and were pleased to take a tour of the sculpture garden there    and the rose garden, both city supported places and quite lovely.  We then went to the Mall of America     that compared very unfavorably to the Edmonton East Mall.  The Mall of America was very dated and very big, and not nearly as classy the Edmonton Mall which was built about 10 years later.

We left Minnesota and arrived in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and were utterly surprised by the amount of interesting things to do.  We took a great tour of the Pabst Mansion and then went to a tour of the Miller Brewing Company the Harley Davidson Museum. That was the biggest surprise!              Eveil Knaevil was there and I took a photo!   What fun!

We spent the night on Lake Geneva and then headed for Chicago.

 

 

Waking up on the Yellowhead Highway

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On the way to our first night's campsite on the Yellowhead Highway we stopped in at Smithers to see a farmer's market and Alpine themed village. After a quick look around we drove through New Hazelton, home of three weird sculptures.        

Then after a good night's sleep we went into Prince George to the wonderfully designed Two Rivers Art Gallery  where the building itself was the main attraction.      

Then we revisited Jasper National Park for a lovely two days.  We were lucky enough to get a campsite at the Snaring River campgrounds that quickly filled up to overflowing.  Even though it seemed to rain on and off the entire time we were in Jasper we had some wonderful hikes and views.  It was deja vue all over again as we went into the same bar we visited 4 years ago to again watch the Olympics and use their wifi!  We visited Angel glacier       where David continued with his obsession with "sleeping Ellen" photos while taking stunning photos of the landscape..  Then David got into the act and....  

The same day we went to Athabascan Falls which thundered over a cliff and was easilty accessible and quite dramatic.     We were able to walk along a dry branch of the river where it used to flow from the falls which was a great geological experience.  Then it waas on to Maligne Creek, but on the way we were treated to a wildlife display!    

Maligne Creek was awesome...thundering water, beautiful pathways, deep gorges!     .

It was hard to leave Jasper and continue on our way to Edmonton.  Let me digress from a chronological tour for a moment to travel the path of the "World's Largest" which Canadians seem to have a fascination with.  So, we saw the World's largest Dragon Fly, Sausage, Boot and Ukrainian Egg..  Unfortunately we were too far south for the World's Largest Perogie. Not much going on in these small communities.

We drove through Stony Plains, a wealthy little community that had over 25 murals depicting their history.    

.  While in Stony Plains we found out about the Blueberry  Bluegrass Festival which we went back to for one day while in Edmonton.  Really great music and quiet camping too!

We camped at a campgrounds in Edmonton, which was very convenient, and not too bad.  Edmonton doesn't have a whole architecturallyy  going on as we found out during a walking tour but did have a unique conservatory displayed by climate zone if 4 distinct glass pyramids. .  They also had a huge  heritage festival covering many acres.  We spent almost the whole day!        .  Good food and great entertainment and great weather.  Speaking of weather, they say that it has been the rainiest summer ever in Canada and we can attest to that, although we have been reasonably lucky to have most of the rain at night.

The big deal in Edmonton is the EDMONTON MALL...drum roll please..which is the second largest mall int he country and features, along with an infinite number of stores, a full sized skating rink, a full sized wave pool, 2 enormous roller coasters, etc., etc.  We spent about 1/2 day there, with David holed up in a coffee shop working on the internet!         .

Outside of Edmonton to the east we visited a wonderfully done re-created Ukrainian village with many costumed interpreters.          .  I really loved the boxes of chalk displayed in the school house because they were exactly the ones that we used when I was in elementary school..

 

On our way through farm country to Saskatoon!