Dipping Our Toes in the Sand

 

I like to find the unusual places to visit on our travels. Atlas Obscura never fails me. This time, we are on our way to The Great Sandhills of Saskatchewan. 

I had warned D that we would be travelling about 40km roundtrip on gravel range roads. Grumbling (all the way), he obliged. The gravel road ended and we then shifted through 2.6km of soft sand track. Where the heck was I taking him? 

Finally, a parking lot with a few cars, and a sign. By this time, D was nearly ready to toss me out the door and drive away, so I was happy we had finally arrived. Going into this excursion, I didn’t know a great deal about the Sandhills – I just thought it would be something different from the flat prairie landscape we’d been driving through for the past several days. 

Turns out, I was right. 

Not exactly the Mojave Desert - but maybe Canada's version?

The Great Sandhills cover an area of over 1,900 square kilometres, and were formed by the sediment deposited from the melting glaciers of the Laurentide Ice Sheet over 13,000 years ago. Though these sand dunes are relatively small (none are over 50ft in height), they can move up to 25ft per year due to wind and sparse ground cover. 

How large do you think this sand formation is?

And then there was the boot tree. That itself was almost worth the drive, don’t you think?

The Boot Tree - a nod to the Sandhill Stockmen's Association

Can you see our van in the parking lot?

Impressed with Empress

Boondocking

We are members of Harvest Host – a network of unique RV camping locations across North America. And unique is certainly a good description for many of the places members have access to. We have stayed at wineries, distilleries, airfield museums, ranches, garden centres, restaurants, and even in people’s back yards. 

Empress, AB was one of those experiences. Boondocking at Jane’s was pretty typical of a Harvest Host Boondockers location, but the town (can you still call it a town when only 150 people live there?) she lives in was something a little different. 

Many homes in Empress are empty, some in a sad state of repair

Even the CP Railway left Empress

Walking down the main street in the middle of the day, I felt like we had landed in an episode of The Twilight Zone. Not a single person on the street. The hospital closed. Weeds growing through the cracks in the parking lot. The school also closed and boarded up tight. Curtains pulled on most of the houses we passed. No one in the yards as we walked by. Just the sound of our footsteps, and the wind in the trees. And then, a giant green combine tractor turns the corner and drives away from us down Main Street. Ah, yes, we must be in Alberta. 

The only live thing on Main Street in Empress

As we walked by the only store in town, the shopkeeper suddenly comes out of the building and calls out to us, “Hello! Where are you from?” I guess he knows everyone in town, and saw an opportunity in these strangers walking by. “Come on in for some ice cream! Or maybe you’d prefer a cappuccino?” We were possibly the first (and maybe the only) customers that day. He was desperate to talk to anyone. 

Turns out, this fellow had a story (don’t we all?), and he was happy to tell us all about it. He’s ridden his bike across Canada – twice. He fell off a cliff and broke his leg trying to impress a girl. Found a whale skeleton 200km inland from sea. All this before finishing university in Calgary. And now, he helps his elderly parents run the local convenience store in some nearly-dead town in the middle of nowhere Alberta, looking like he might just be the one who eats a lot of the ice cream in the store. There’s another story there, I just know it. Maybe we'll go back one day to hear it.

Second Chances

The perfect spot to relax!

Last year, on our way home from the LTV rally in Winkler MB, we wanted to stop at Waterton Lakes National Park in southwest Alberta. At the time, the campground was full, so we continued on our way towards home, and didn’t even bother to drive through the park. 

 

This year, D booked a night at the park. The drive there from Fernie BC was WINDY! We had wind gusts of over 60km, which made for a difficult drive, and the RV made terrible rattling noises that concerned us very much (we later figured out it was likely just the screen on the roof vent rattling in the crosswind – phew!). After such a stressful drive, we decided to stay two nights so we could recuperate from the experience. And we were glad we did!

Waterton Lakes NP is on the edge of the Rockies, where the steep mountain ranges meet the rolling prairies. There are three lakes – Upper, Middle, and Lower Waterton Lakes. Upper Waterton Lake actually straddles the Canada/US border and if you want to travel up the lake, or hike in the backcountry surrounding it, you need your passport and you must report to US Customs online before you go. 

On our walk around the village of Waterton, we visited the Prince of Wales Hotel on the hill with lovely views overlooking the lake, the mountains, and the village. Built in the 1930’s, the hotel still has all the tradition, charm and feel of the era. They still serve afternoon tea in the Windsor Lounge, and the hotel and restaurant staff are dressed in tartan scarves and kilts. 

The view from the lobby of the hotel

Deer everywhere, and not at all afraid of humans!

Later that evening, we participated in a ‘cooking’ class that was quite a different experience for us - a pemmican making workshop. Charlie, a member of the local Black Foot tribe, spoke of the history of his people in the area, and the history of pemmican making. Did you know, that when properly made, pemmican can be stored for over 30 years?! Pemmican is made with only three ingredients: dried meat (traditionally buffalo, but we used dried beef), berries (the First Nations people traditionally used saskatoon berries or choke cherries) and rendered fat (tallow). We used a rock to pound the dried beef to a powder, and then added the fat and the berries. It was hard work to make only a small amount (about 100g of dried beef), but Charlie told us his ancestors would typically make pemmican from the meat of many bison. Each bison can yield up to 400 pounds of meat! 

We haven't been brave enough to try our pemmican!

Before leaving Waterton Lakes on our final day, we diverted off the main road to drive through the scenic Blakiston Valley to Red Rock Canyon (named for the beds of argillite rock in the canyon). The walk along the river trail was fascinating and beautiful – I highly recommend the 30km round-trip detour if you ever make it to the park.

Off to a Great Start!

 

Note: I am almost two weeks behind on blog posts.

The adventure begins (at the end of May) and the first stop on our adventure was Osoyoos, BC. Actually, our first stop was at the Twisted Hills Craft Cidery in Keremeos to stock up on cider for me, THEN we made our way to Nk'Mip RV Campground in Osoyoos for the LTV Western Sunsetters 2024 rally, now known as Winkler West. (More on that another day).

D and I were co-organizers of this year's event. When we attended our first LTV rally last year at Seal Bay on Vancouver Island, there were 53 vans, and about 100 people. We had such a good time that D agreed to help organize the next one. This year, we expected a similar number of vans to register, but almost doubled it! With 102 vans and close to 200 people, it was quite the party! Met some wonderful people and learned a lot about the LTV cult(ure).

Some additional highlights of our stay at Osoyoos:

Dinner at The Bear, The Fish, The Root and The Berry - unique indigenous cuisine, and one of the best meals D and I have ever had! The bison was melt-in-your-mouth amazing. If you have the opportunity to visit Osoyoos any time soon, you really MUST try this restaurant.

Desert Cultural Centre at Nk'Mip - we had arranged a guided tour for rally attendees, and were able to take some time off rally 'work' to visit the cultural centre for a tour ourselves. I think both D and I have honest ideas about indigenous peoples in Canada, but I came away with a new understanding of the culture, and the effects that colonization had on indigenous people and their culture. And I learned a bit about the local plants and their uses, too!

At the entrance to the campground, there is a paddock with horses used for guided trail rides. As we walked by on our way to the cultural centre, we couldn't help but laugh at the sight we found. I'll let you make up your own caption for this image!

The Great Adventure

Many, many months ago, we hatched a plan to embark on an exciting adventure. Our idea was to drive our RV across Canada to Newfoundland. Newfoundland has for years been a place I've wanted to visit - in part with thanks to those hauntingly beautiful Newfoundland and Labrador Tourism commercials that, for the past several year, have welcomely interrupted my favourite TV shows. (And of course the quilts in the commercial linked below were the clincher for me.)

With a little planning, we are now on our way, expecting we may be on the road for as long as a year (much to the surprise of many who know us). Although we do have a general trip plan for the first part of the adventure, we are excited by the idea of straying off the main route to find unique, off-the-beaten-path locations and scenic sites. We are not tied down to a schedule, the "If it's Tuesday we must be in Moose Jaw," kind of thing. Nope. We are footloose and fancy free. And quite looking forward to what lies ahead.

I hope you will follow along as we make our way across this beautiful country, discovering new places, new people, and new adventures.