Dan and I had planned a camping trip somewhere on the North Shore or near Thunder Bay this weekend. A look at the weather forecast for that area showed a bunch of crap - cloudy, cold and rainy all weekend. Looking a little further west showed one nice day (Saturday) and not quite as much rain the rest of the weekend, so a last minute decision was made to head to Winnipeg and southwest Ontario.
We took off from his house around 9pm, and pulled into Grand Forks about 4 hours later. Yes, it should've taken close to 5 hours, but the speed limit is merely a suggestion to some of us. About the only excitement was seeing the sunrise over Fargo around midnight. If you've ever driven to Fargo at night, you'll know what I'm talking about. In Grand Forks, we made a quick stop at Sugar's Lounge & Casino for a beer and a Scooby Snack before closing time. Random observation #1 & 2: casinos in North Dakota are a joke (2 table games in a bar don't make it a casino) and it's best to drink a Scooby Snack without looking at it (a shot containing milk with an odd neon green tint is not appealing).
Saturday am: the sun is out! We make a run for the border and they let us through, eventually. The obligatory pitstop was made at the Manitoba welcome centre, with the obligatory photos of us in front of the sign. Random observation #3: they like to spell things differently in Canada, so I will follow suit but most likely screw things up.
There wasn't much to see from the border to Winnipeg. Once in the city we drove to our campground, set up the tent and headed into the city. After driving around aimlessly for a bit, we got out and ate at some little place on the river (which river, I don't know?). Had a couple beers, enjoyed the sun and watched some random people doing random things. With the randomness out of the way, we headed to a coffee shop and people watched for a bit.
That evening we went to the Blue Bombers game. If you don't know (and why would you, if you're from the U.S.?) the Blue Bombers are Winnipeg's CFL franchise. That's Canadian Football League, if you're completely lost. They were playing the Toronto Argonauts in a battle royale between the 2 crappiest teams in the league. Beforehand we ran into some nice elderly women in the parking lot who told us how much they hate the Bombers coach and other such things. We also illegally drank beer in the parking lot but we're foreigners so it's OK.
The game itself was fun - only 3 downs instead of 4, a longer field and a lot more passing than U.S. football makes for a good time. It also helped that we moved into Section S (the student section) after the 1st quarter. If you want to watch people get rowdy, crude and obnoxious, this was the place to be and was certainly more fun than watching the game. Nobody was ejected or arrested, but not for a lack of trying or enouragement from the fans. Bonus points for sitting under the upper deck which came in handy when it started to rain near the end of the game. I had my first encounter with poutine - french fries with cheese and gravy. Yikes.
After the game, we went to a birthday for someone we didn't know. Those are always fun because you're under no obligation to pretend to care about the guest of honor. We met a lot of friendly Winnipeggers, some friendlier than others, and did not get kicked out for any bad behaviour. (When in doubt, blame it on the foreigners, eh?) There did come a time when we decided to leave before being asked to leave, but that does not count as being kicked out in my mind. Random observation #4 and 5: Winnipeggers are very friendly (at least until their laptop hits the floor and is doused in beer), and gaydar apparently doesn't work as well in Winnipeg as it does in Minnesota. Ask me how I know this. :-)
We also had a random Adam Lambert sighting at the party.
Back at the campground, it was a short night. Going to bed at 3am does that for you. Apparently I slept like a dead person because I finally woke up at about 11am when Dan started dismantling the tent with me still in it. I wisely decided to get up and help. A little while later we were at a bar watching the Vikings game against the 49ers (the one with the last second crazy touchdown pass from Favre to what's-his-name). And that concludes our Winnipeg portion of the journey.
On to Ontario: We decided to spend the night in Kenora. I slept most of the way there so I can't tell you much about the drive except we didn't see a single animal. We saw some tree stumps masquerading as bears and wolves but no real animals. Unless you count ravens as being animals.
Kenora is alright, we made the obligatory pitstop to say hi to Husky the Muskie, then checked in and took a nap. We had dinner at some pizza place (I'm thinking Boston Pizza, which is an odd name for a Canadian pizza chain) then headed back to the hotel. Very exciting, eh?
In the morning we headed back along a very scenic section of highway, mostly winding along Lake of the Woods until we got closer to the border.
After a quick stop for lunch somewhere, we crossed back into the U.S. and made predictably good time back home, except for the brief stop at a real casino and another brief stretch when I was driving - which means we were within 10 mph of the speed limit for a change.
Photos are
here.
This guy - not so fierce. Nice background but a bit too uptight I think.
This kind of jumped out at me. A giant tongue has that effect on most people.
I thought this was a photograph from a distance (even up close, I guess). However, it's a painting the artist did of himself, using an 8X10 photo (self-portrait, if you will) as his guide. 8X10 inches, that is. I can't even imagine the difficulty in scaling up from that size to the monstrosity this painting is, but he did it and did it well.
And here's the outside - not a great shot but it was raining and I didn't have a tripod, so it will have to do for now. I may go back and get a better shot when the weather is better and I can take more time on it.
