Flin Flon

We all spent the day catching up on domestic chores. Mike and Al worked on the RVs and Symphony and I went to the laundromat and did laundry. After lunch Mike and I drove into town to find a car wash and then did some shopping at Canadian Tire.

We also stopped in at the Flin Flon Chamber of Commerce to pick up some visitor information. We had a pleasant visit with the young lady working there and learned that she and her family had moved to Flin Flon from South Africa. Her husband was working at the Hudson Bay Mining and Smelting Co.'s #777 mine here in Flin Flon where they mine zinc, copper and gold.

We bought a Delissio frozen pizza at the Extra Foods grocery store to have for dinner tonight. Delissio is the Canadian Kraft brand version of Digiorno pizzas. Generally when I'm grocery shopping in Canada, I look for food labels that are similar to the ones in the US for food that we eat. The names may be somewhat different than the US brands, but are made by the same companies - Kraft, Pillsbury, etc.

While we were running our errands, Al and Symphony went to the Flin Flon Station Museum here a the campground. When we got back to the campground, they told us how nice the museum was and how much they enjoyed it. We'll be going there in the morning to the museum before we all go sightseeing in Flin Flon.

Al and Symphony went for a bike ride after dinner and I took a photo of them with their bikes on top of a large outcrop near our RV. While they were out bike riding, Mike and I read through the brochures we picked up at the Chamber of Commerce to see where we can go sightseeing.

From Flin Flon, Manitoba

Flin Flon is a unique city built on top of the Precambrian Shield which is part of the Amisk Volcanic Belt that was formed 1.9 billion years ago by underwater volcanic eruptions. This volcanic belt is the source of the minerals found here - zinc, copper, silver and gold. Flin Flon has a population of about 6200 people and is Manitoba's 9th largest community. The Hudson Bay Mining Co. is the largest employer here and tourism is second.

Swan River to Flin Flon

It was 49° F (9°C) this morning when we got up. We left Green Acres about 9:30 and drove north on Hwy 10. Once out of Swan River there were fewer and fewer houses - we would go miles before seeing a house. I started noticing the road signs and instead of names, most of them were numbered. The one below is named 247 N.

From Flin Flon, Manitoba

We crossed the 53rd Parallel about 60 miles north of Swan River.

From Flin Flon, Manitoba

A little before noon we found a place where we could pull off of the highway and have lunch. We were 116 miles north of Swan River and 20 miles south of The Pas. As you can see by the photo below, there isn't even much traffic on Hwy 10.

From Flin Flon, Manitoba

We drove through the town of The Pas, known as "The Gateway to the North" and one of the oldest settlements in northern Manitoba. In February they have the Trapper's Festival celebrating the town's heritage as a meeting center for fur traders.

From Flin Flon, Manitoba

We crossed the 54th Parallel about 15 miles north of The Pas.

From Flin Flon, Manitoba

We got into Flin Flon at 2:40. We're staying at the Tourist Park & Campground. The campground is operated by the City of Flin Flon.

We had some rain along the way here and it has really began to feel like summer - our high was 79° (26°C). We traveled 228 miles today. We normally drive about 55 mph, but we averaged around 45 mph because Hwy 10 was so rough.

After settling in at our campsite (#4), Mike and I drove into downtown Flin Flon. Symphony and Al wanted to ride their bikes around the campground, so they didn't go with us. We found a Subway in town and decided to stop there to get subs to take back to the RV.

From Flin Flon, Manitoba

Lake Audy to Swan River, MB

I finally got a photo of the loon that's been here at the lake.

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We've decided that Symphony and I will follow our RVs in our cars instead of towing them behind the RVs. This is what the Vue looks like from just driving out here.

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We left Lake Audy this morning at 9:30 and drove through the Bison Enclosure to the eastern entrance of Riding Mountain National Park. A deer ran out of the woods in front of the Adventurer and I managed to get a photo of it running on the road ahead of the RV (still wish I had a stronger telephoto on the camera).

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We drove north on Hwy 10 to Dauphin. We stopped at a Shell station to get gas - 172.172 ltr for $0.999 a liter (45.496 gallons at $3.582 a gallon) and we bought groceries at the WalMart. Since we were parked at WalMart, we decided to have lunch before heading on to Swan River.

We arrived at Green Acres Campground in Swan River about 3:45 after driving 157 miles from Lake Audy.

We are on site #47 and Al and Symphony are next to us. We have full hookups with 30 amp electric. As you can see by the photo below, the campsites are covered with grass. We are able to get satellite TV reception and we can pick up some local Canadian TV stations. We'll just be here for 1 night before heading north to Flin Flon. Our 1 night stay cost $23.63 CAD ($21.41 US).

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Last Day at Lake Audy

It looks like the rain has cleared out for a while. We spent the day just relaxing and preparing for our departure tomorrow.

This morning I did manage to get a photo of a couple of white pelicans that are staying here at Lake Audy. If you look real hard, you can see 2 white specks out on the lake.

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I took the photo using the telephoto setting on our camera. This is one of those times I wish we had a more powerful telephoto setting on it.

I'm still trying to get a photo of the loon that has been hanging around here - maybe tomorrow.

July 31

We were supposed to leave today, but we've decided to stay an extra day. So we filled out another envelope and paid $15.70 CAD ($14.22 US). We spent our day just hanging around the campsite.

Even though our temps have been in the mid-40's in the mornings and up to the low 60's in the afternoon, Tinker thinks it is WAY too COLD for July.

From Manitoba

Symphony did give Al a haircut this afternoon -

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and we had another great sunset over Lake Audy.

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Lake Audy & BIson Range

It was still cloudy and overcast this morning when we got up. We said goodbye to Jack & Bonnie this morning before they left.

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In 1937 this area was designated as a national park now known as Riding Mountain National Park. This area was once home to bison, but were hunted to near extinction by 1875. In 1931 16 bison were re-introduced to the Park and now the herd numbers around 40 bison. The Bison Enclosure is just down the road from the campground and we drove through it today.

We followed the signs off the main road in the hopes of seeing some bison. Well, we weren't disappointed. As a matter of fact, we came across a fellow who wanted to impress upon us that this was HIS territory. He started out at the side of the road, but moved into the road and we sat in the car for about 10 minutes before this fellow moved over to the other side of the road.

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Once we were back on the road we came across the maid herd of bison which included some calves.

After leaving the Bison Enclosure we drove over to the Horse Corral Campground to see it. Here Mike & Al had another opportunity to add to their collection of outhouses.

From Mike and Al's Outhouse Tour

We then headed back to the RVs. Tinker took a nap-

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we had dinner outside (the rain had stopped) -

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and we had a great sunset!

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Wasagaming to Lake Audy

We were up early this morning to head over to Lake Audy Campground.

While Mike & Al stopped at the dump station to empty the RV tanks, Symphony & I drove our cars out to Lake Audy. I used our Garmin gps for the trip and Mike used our laptop to follow the route out to the campground. We took Hwy 10 south from Wasagaming & then followed Hwy 354 to the entrance to Riding Mountain National Park - no wrong turns this time.

We arrived at Lake Audy about 8 a.m. and was relieved to see that no one had taken the 2 campsites that we wanted. Mike had seen a photo of these 2 campsites in a brochure and thought they were perfect. Symphony & I sat in her car while we waited for Mike & Al to come in the RVs.

Mike & Al arrived a little before 9 a.m. We are on site #14 with no hookups, but the best view of Lake Audy. We parked the RVs facing each other so each of us would have the best view from the windows.

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Lake Audy Campground is a self-registration campground. We filled out an envelope with our information & site # and paid $47.10 CAD ($42.67 US) for 3 days.

The weather was nice when we arrived this morning - sunny and blue skies. After setting up our RVs, we all went for a walk around the campground. Since it's still early in the camping season, there are only a few people here.

From Mike and Al's Outhouse Tour

Our biggest problem was how to get a photo of our campsites as viewed from the lake. Imagine our good luck to see 2 kayakers out on the lake! Mike explained to them  that we had been trying to figure out how to get some photos of our campsite viewed from the lake and they said they would be happy to take some photos for us. Jack & Bonnie are from Calgary and are staying just a few campsites over from us.

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Jack & Bonnie each had a camera and they both took photos of us from their kayaks. Later on this afternoon they came over to the RV and we downloaded their photos and movies to our computer. They stayed a while and we all had a nice visit - a great couple. We would have liked to visit with them longer, but Jack & Bonnie are leaving tomorrow.

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This afternoon the dark clouds and rain moved in and we had rain off and on, but we have one of the best campsites ever!!

7/28 Winnipeg to Wassagaming

We left Traveller's RV Resort this morning at 9:45 and headed west on Trans Canada 1. We stopped for gas at a Flying J in Headingley. We got 83.295 litres (21.92 gal) for $.964 CAD a litre ($3.312 US a gallon).

Along the way we kept seeing blue and yellow fields of crops. I've since found out that the blue/lavendar fields are flax seed and the yellow fields are canola.

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We changed to Trans Canada 16 (Yellowhead Highway) and stopped at noon at a restaurant/gas station that was closed in Westbourne.

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We stopped at a rest area west of Minnedosa for about a half hour before going north on Highway 10 to Wasagaming Campground in Riding Mountain National Park.

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We arrived at Wasagaming Campground a little after 3 p.m. Riding Mountain National Park is 190 miles from Winnipeg.

We are on site 116 and Al & Symphony are in the site next to us. We have 30 amp electric and there is a water spigot a couple of sites from us. It's a gravel site pretty level with lots of trees, so no satellite TV. There are 3 local TV stations that we can pick up. We will be here just one night and we paid $43.10 CAD (40.07 US) for our site.

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We bought 2 Canadian National Park Passes (annual) for $57.90 CAD each ($54.27 US) when we checked in to the campground. We purchased the National Park Passes so we wouldn't have to pay the daily entrance fees at the Canadian National Parks, but it doesn't give us any discount on the camping fees.

After settling in at the campground, Mike and I drove out to Lake Audy Campground to check it out. Lake Audy is a self-registration campground, so we can't reserve a campsite. We took our new Garmin GPS to try it out in the car. Lake Audy is about 41 km (25 mi) west of Wasagaming. There are 2 ways to Lake Audy and we will be going in the southern entrance. We found out that the local roads to Lake Audy don't have many road signs and we stopped a man in a pickup truck to make sure we were on the right road. We found out that we should have gone straight instead of making the last turn the GPS told us to make.

We followed his directions and found the entrance to the park with no problem. We were happy to see that the campsites we hope to get were vacant. After looking around the campground for a while, we went back to Wasagaming. Once back here we got with Al and Symphony and made plans for an early departure tomorrow morning.

The Manitoba Museum

This morning the four of us drove into town to visit The Manitoba Museum. The entrance fee for seniors was $6.50 CAD including tax. We started our tour in the Orientation Gallery depicting the relationship of humans with the natural environment - which is the theme of the Museum.

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Our next stop was the Earth History Gallery showing the geologic history of Manitoba and some of the earliest inhabitants including a replica of the world's largest trilobite and the 14-foot Giant Sloth and a replica of the world's largest trilobite.

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The Arctic/Sub-Arctic Gallery was our next stop. We saw displays of wildlife that inhabit the arctic and sub-arctic regions. We learned about the lives of the Caribou Inuit who hunted and fished this area.

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We "travelled" next to the Boreal Forest Gallery. This forest covers almost one-third of Manitoba. There was a life-sized display of an Algonquin Encampment showing their everyday life. The display included many of the wildlife that inhabits the boreal forest.

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The next gallery was the Nonsuch Gallery. We were able to walk aboard a replica of the Nonsuch "anchored" at a recreation of a 17th century English waterfront. The replica was built in England in 1970 to celebrate the tricentennial of the Hudson' Bay Company and was sailed over 14,000 kilometres from England before ending up at the Museum. The original Nonsuch sailed into Hudson Bay in 1668 in search of furs. This voyage lead to the founding of the Hudson's Bay Company and was instrumental in established commerce in western Canada.

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Hudson's Bay Gallery spans over 300 years of the Company's history. Besides learning about the Company's history, we learned that Hudson's Bay Company is still in business and is Canada's largest diversified general merchandise retailer.

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In the Parklands/Mixed Woods Gallery is a transition from teh Boreal Forest to the Grasslands showing a larger diversity of wildlife and a 27-metre mural depicting an Ukrainian Rye Farm.

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In the Grasslands Gallery we learned that the great grasslands had been home to enormous herds of bison, but with the settlement of the Red River region the herds disappeared. Here were displays of a sod house and a log cabin.

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Our final stop was at the Urban Gallery where we walked the wooden boardwalks of 1920's Winnipeg. Here we entered the various businesses and homes of Winnipeg during it's boom time.

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The Manitoba Museum also has a Science Gallery and Planetarium, but we didn't visit them.

After leaving the Museum we stopped at a Wendy's for lunch before heading over to Costco.
Al and Symphony have a Garmin GPS and we have been using it for our sightseeing trips. We found one at Costco and decided to buy it for ourselves. We use Microsoft's Streets and Trips for our route planning and a Delorme USB GPS on our laptop in the RV. We have used our laptop in the car with the USB GPS, but it isn't as convenient as having a smaller GPS. There were 2 Garmin GPS' at Costco and the one we bought has lifetime traffic updates included and it was only $30 more than the GPS where we would have to pay a subscription for the traffic updates.

We then headed back to the campground to get ready for our departure tomorrow. I'm looking forward to using our Garmin GPS tomorrow on our trip and see how it compares to the one on our laptop

Western Canada Aviation Museum

Today we split up - the guys went sightseeing. Symphony and I went grocery shopping and wifi-ing.

This afternoon Mike and Al visited the Western Canada Aviation Museum which is near the Winnipeg International Airport. It is the second largest aviation museum in Canada.

The displays included 100 Years of Flight covering Canada's aviation history and aviation pioneers including Canada's first helicopter.

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There is a Bush Flying Gallery dedicated to the bush pilots and their planes - including the "Cadillac" of bush planes.

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There was a large display of "nose art" showing the creativity of air crews.

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Then there was the Avrocar - a replica of a flying saucer- that was built in a secret contract between the United States military and Avro Canada during the Cold War years.

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Mike and Al told us they had a great time at the museum today.

Assiniboine Park Zoo

This morning we went to the Assiniboine Park Zoo located on the west side of Winnipeg about 15 miles (24 km) from the campground. We arrived a few minutes after the zoo opened at 9:00. The admission for seniors was $4.25.

We decided to start our tour with the bear range. There was no polar bear at the zoo. We learned that Debby, the resident polar bear, had died last November at the age of 42 (the oldest living polar bear in the world). Besides the grizzly bear and black bear, we saw a rare white black bear. The white color is due to lack of a black hair pigment called melanin. 

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We continued on our tour of the zoo to the Australian Exhibit, Monkey House, owls, American Bison and much, much more.

At the American Bison exhibit we saw 2 young white calves. As in the white black bear, a white buffalo occurs as the result of a recessive mutation that leaves the hair follicles without the dark pigment melanin.

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We spent about 3 hours at the zoo enjoying the animal exhibits and the great weather. As we were leaving, we saw the sculpture Winnie-the-Bear and Harry Colebourne. Here we learned about the true story that Winnie the Pooh stories are based on.

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After leaving the zoo, we started looking for a place to have lunch before going back to the RV park.  We found an Olive Garden and decided to have their All-You-Can-Eat soup and salad - always a good meal.

Once we got back to the RV I fixed a pot of coffee and turned it on. Nothing!! The coffee pot was DEAD. It was a Black & Decker undercounter coffee maker that we just had sitting on the counter. I like it because the water and coffee can be filled from the front of the coffee maker and not from the top. I had seen a Delonghi coffee maker in a Sam's some time ago that was similar, but what are the odds that I can find one today?

Symphony and I were going to wifi at a Fyxx Espresso coffee shop this afternoon and I told her we needed to go shopping for a coffee pot. We drove up to the Sears at St. Vital Centre and imagine my surprise and delight to find the Delonghi coffee maker that I wanted at Sears!! Of course, it was more expensive there than it would have been at Sam's, but it was the one I wanted and I wouldn't have to spend a lot of time shopping for a coffee maker. Afterwards Symphony and I stopped at Fyxx Espresso to wifi and have iced cappuccino, before going back to the RV park.

Pick up Mail in Pembina, ND

We called American Home Base last Monday to have our mail sent to General Delivery, Pembina, North Dakota. So we drove down Hwy 75 to Pembina this morning. Pembina is 88 miles (140 km) south of Winnipeg and is the closest post office in the US where we can have mail sent to General Delivery.

There was quite a line of vehicles waiting to cross the border into North Dakota. Canadian Highway 75 turns into Interstate 29 on the US side of the border.

From Manitoba

From Manitoba

After picking up our mail at the post office, we stopped at Gastrak Truck Stop to have lunch at the deli before crossing the US/Canada border and heading back to Winnipeg.


had lunch

Royal Canadian Mint

We spent yesterday settling in here at Traveller's RV Resort. Symphony and I did laundry at the campground laundromat and bought groceries at a Safeway near here.

After lunch the four of us visited the Royal Canadian Mint which is only 4 miles from the campground. The entrance to the Winnipeg Royal Canadian Mint is lined with flags that represent the foreign countries that have their coins minted here.

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Once inside the Mint we signed up for the 1:30 English tour of the mint - $5 each for the tour. We wondered around the Boutique while we waited for our tour to begin. You can actually pick up a gold bar to see how much it weighs! Of course, there is an armed guard standing there and the bar is secured with a large chain to the stand.

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Our tour started on the second floor of the mint. We learned that the Winnipeg facility mints all of the Canadian circulation coins. They also mint coins for over 70 foreign countries. The facility in Ottawa mints all of the commemorative coins. We learned about coin production starting from raw metal to the final stamped coins. Unfortunately, we weren't allowed to take photos on the tour. After our tour we stopped by the Boutique to purchase some souvenirs.

Before heading back to the campground, we drove over to Costco on the west side of Winnipeg do some shopping.

It's really feeling like summer now; our high today was 77°F (25°C).

Kenora to Winnipeg

It's starting to feel more like summer now. It was 63°F (17°C) this morning. By the time we broke camp and stopped to dump our tanks at the dump station, it was 10:15 when we left Anicinabe RV Park.

We stopped at the Canadian Tire Store just up the road to buy gas before leaving Kenora. We got 172.979 ltrs at $1.029 a liter; which converts to 45.521 gallons at $3.598 a gallon. We headed west on Hwy 17 through Kenora.

From Ontario

We stopped at the Manitoba Information Centre just across the border of Manitoba and Ontario to pick up maps and sightseeing brochures.

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It was after 12:00 when we got back to the RVs and we decided to have lunch before going on to Winnipeg.

We arrived at Traveller's RV Resort on the SE side of Winnipeg about 2:30 (123 miles from Kenora). Traveller's RV Resort is a Coast to Coast campground. We are in site 202. It is a pull-through and we have 50 amp electric and water and sewer. Symphony and Al are next to us in site 203. It really was feeling like summer this afternoon - 75°F (24°C)!

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We will be here for 7 days. Our site is pretty level for a gravel site. We don't have a patio, but there is grass between the RVs. There is plenty of room between the RVs which is nice. Also, garbage is picked up daily at the site.