[A/S] Fwd: TWIMC Off the Laurentian Shield!

["Sandy Noyes" <boojum@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

I finally made the western edge of the Laurentian Shield somewhere
around Thunder Bay. What a relief. From there west he road smoothed out
and became less and less wandering. The country in western Ontario
looks a lot like what I have seen in pictures of Scandanavia. Open land
covered in fir trees and dotted with lakes. Lots of small lakes and one
big, big lake: Superior. 

I passed through Kenora and picked up filters for the truck. Cummins
parts are much cheaper in Canada than the US, and that is before the
currency difference is factored in! I picked up 6 oil filters at less
than US$3.00 each. They are close to US$10 in the states. The six
filters and two fuel filters came to CDN$60, US$40. That sure made my
day.

I bought them in Kenora, a beautiful town in Western Ontario. The last
large town in Western Ontario. What a beautiful town it is. Lets say
that Scandanavia looks like Canada, OK, eh? The town has a lovely large
harbor with a huge meandering coastline which allows numerous little
harbors abounding with watercraft of all sorts. Fishing is way big up
here, folks. Bait and tackle shops line the edge of the Trans Canada
Highway, the "TCH" and there are almost as many signs for fishing camps
as for bush pilot services and guides. Hunting is big, too.

And, as for game and wild animals, it is up here, too. West of Kenora
what ambles across the road but a brown bear. No big rush, just fast
enough to fit between the sparse traffic on the TCH; it kind of loped
across until it got to the edge of the woods and then scampered into
the undergrowth and vanished from sight. It just melted. Wow! First
bear I have ever seen in the wild. It did not seem that large, either.
But I was passing in a large truck high off the ground. I am sure that
if I encountered it on foot, face to face it would have seemed about
two stories high. :o)

Further down the road on the eastern edge of Prawda the highway is
separated by a band of woods about a half a kilometer wide. That ends
and the east and westbound highway halves come closer together and the
woods disappear. Just as the lanes started to approach what was in the
center but old "banjo nose"; a large moose feeding from the water
plants in a marshy area in between the road halves. The guy in front of
me stopped very quickly and pulled off the highway to look and take a
picture. I could not stop safely in time so I drove to a turn around an
came back; too late. The way the two of us stopped, or tried to stop so
suddenly made me think that I bet more tourists get killed trying to
stop and see wildlife than do in the hunting of it. :o) The locals
whizzed on by no more interested than if it had been some farmer's
livestock grazing.

I spent the night in a campground in Prawda by a brook. It is very
pretty and I fell asleep listening to the brook running by. I walked
the two dogs for the last time before turning in last night. I had
planned it to be a long walk but there are some very aggressive
mosquitoes here. The persistent little devils followed me into the
trailer. I must have had a sign on that said "chuck wagon" in
mosquitoese.

The countryside is so much more open. Driving along I pass lovely deep
blue little ponds and lakes. If I had a boat or canoe with me I would
not have gotten much past Kenora, some 200 kilometers east of here.
THere are so many places to fish and explore. The countryside reminds
me of Maine where I passed many summers as a kid; very happy summers.
It is a similar rugged country here.

Winnipeg is Red River country and the river itself divides the city.
Historically the communication in this part of the country has been
north - south rather than east - west: that damned Laurentian Shield
again. It is still today. The "LS" effectively divides east - west
communication. The CBC mentioned an appeal to raise funds for folks in
North Dakota who were wiped out in the spring floods. After I pass
Winnipeg I will be entering the Canadian plains where the "wheat
miners" raise the famous Canadian red durham winter wheat that is
prized the world over. I believe the Ukranians were the first to raise
this wheat in Canada. THe climate here was what they were used to and
they knew how it is done. The weather window needed for a successful
crop is very narrow and week or two of a lingering winter or an early
frost can put these guys out of business for the year. Wheat is a tough
business this far north. I guess it is why they are called wheat
"miners" as it is a struggle to raise wheat. These farmers are not only
tough but radical, too. They organized early on for good grain prices
and formed their own political parties. The "Grits" was a famous and
powerful one. One great motto the organizers had was, "The farmer feeds
us all; who feeds the farmer?" So, for me, this country is not only
very beautiful, it is a chance to see the land I studied. My hat is off
to all those patient Canadian professors back in Montreal. As unlikely
as it seemed in 1973 I remember what they pounded into my head.
Memories of PM's like Sir John "A" (McDonald), Sir Wilfed Laurier, the
great metis leader Riel, and so on. Stories of voyageurs and courriers
du bois, those mostly French-Canadian trappers who roamed these forests
boggle my mind when I remember that these guys paddled form Thunder Bay
to Montreal in a birch bark canoe carrying over a thousand pounds of
beaver pelts. We're talking real men here, folks.

So this trip is great for me to see what I have read about. It is a
trip through a beautiful history book. The folks are real nice, so far.
And I kind of doubt that there is a band of snots waiting to waylay me
in Alberta. The people who run this park are German immigrants.
Thankfully I was able to muster up enough nearly forgotten German to
have a nice chat with them. They were as surprised as I that I could
still do it. And speaking German allowed me to use their phone line for
e-mail. Nice folks from Bad Wurttenburg with a visiting nephew. His Dad
and he have emigrated Germany and when they get some more money Mom is
coming out. Reminds me of my grandparents.


OK, that's it for today.

Happy Trails.

L8R