The horseback riding just put us in the mood for even more large herbivores, so we drove out to the Lake Audy bison preserve, still in Riding Mountain National Park. It’s a very large fenced in area beside the lake where the bison are free to roam. You drive into the preserve and can observe the bison from the safety of a gated viewing platform, or drive your car around on a looped gravel road to get a better view. We tried both but the bison are damned cagey beasts and came nowhere near the platform or road. In fact, they stayed almost exactly equidistant from every viewing position. No way that’s fluke. There is a bison Archimedes working out the angles. We stayed on into dusk viewing them through binoculars and spotting scope. Don’t tell Steph, but I let the Those Johnston Kids sit in the sunroof while we drove slowly around, just like being on safari. I did my best Marlin Perkins.

We stayed so late that it was dark by the time we got back to our campsite. That’s late. I’m not sure if I’m mentioned, but we are so far north that sunset is quite late, and darkness doesn’t fall until long after that. There is still quite enough evening light to read by at 11 PM. That, combined with an utter lack of official bedtime has the kids burning their lamps long after they would ordinarily be asleep. Whatever – we’re on vacation.

The 10th broke clear and sunny, so we were of a mind to partake of some of Wasagaming’s fine beach action. We hitched up our wagon and headed downtown, if it can be called that in a town that’s only 3 blocks long.

Wasagaming in Riding Mountain National Park is cute and picturesque in a way that immediately reminded me of a smaller version of Banff, Alberta, if you’ve ever been there. That’s a positive comparison, but surely these little towns can come up with something more original than handmade soaps, candy and carven <insert local animal here> to flog to the tourists. It’s all lovely, really, but when coming upon some new place on the road, I don’t really want to be reminded immediately of some other place. I’d rather each locale was it’s own thing, unique and beautiful in its own way.

The beach was pleasant, although the man-made strip of sand had a curious crunchy texture to it, as if it was a mixture of sand and plain old dirt. I guess there isn’t a lot of fine beach sand in the Canadian Shield, even at its margins where we were. The shallow water, while not warm, was bearable enough to enjoy. We caught and inspected many crayfish, which I was happy to see. The waters around Cape Croker were filled with them when I was a boy, but you don’t find them much any more. Acid rain all but wiped them out, I think.

After our swim, we enjoyed a beavertail and a walk about. The nice thing about resort towns is that nobody is doing anything particularly important. I like it that people pause and look around rather than always looking straight ahead, as they do in the city.

There’s a short wetland hiking trail just outside town, within easy walking distance. The visitor centre loaned out dip nets for kids to pull little live things, snails and bugs and such, out of the water to look at. We had our own net already and went to check it out. It was quite a hot day, so it wasn’t a brisk hike. The trail was actually wooden, constructed on floats, and wound throughout the wetland area. It was neat, but although our net was ever at the ready, we didn’t see a sign of life in the water. Too many kids dip netting off the boardwalk perhaps. Pausing to shade ourselves in a little floating gazebo, we did salvage a floating Bud Light can, so the walk was not totally fruitless.

We returned to the car to continue our journey. On the way out of town, we stopped at the town pumping station to refill our water jug. With no AC, and the car turning into a mobile broiler, it seemed prudent to have fluids on hand.

Our destination for Thursday, the 9th of July, was Riding Mountain National Park. We really had no idea what we would find there, but I had seen a brochure somewhere that said horseback riding was one of the activities in the park. Baby Girl dearly wanted to ride a horse. We took our regretful leave of Aunt Maria outside the candy train, and after exiting stocked with sugary provisions, we sped off for Riding Mountain.

Not really. We discovered that the road work in Winnipeg was actually just a microcosm of the province. Manitoba is currently being entirely rebuilt. At least the parts that carry vehicles. It is impossible to get from anywhere to anywhere else with any sort of efficiency. We crawled north on roads half-built or half-ruined, depending on your personal level of optimism or credulity, being led desultorily by somnolescent road crew workers.

The interminable drive was only made worse by the heat. While nights have been consistently cool, daytime temperatures have been climbing as we move west. The air conditioning in the car has been acting up, running long enough to just remind you of what it feels like to not stick to yourself, but then gradually giving up and blowing warm air. It’s maddening. We stopped frequently for drinks.

The flat prairie around Winnipeg grew into rumpled folds of land dressed in pine forest by the time we reached the park. We were all a bit surprised to find the small resort town of Wasagaming just inside the park, bustling on the shore of Clear Lake. It clearly bills itself as a water sport town as the quaint shops lining the main drag sold a mix of souvenirs, ice cream, and water paraphernalia. At the visitor’s centre, the friendly staff gave us a reference to the only nearby horse ranch that would take kids riding. It was already 4 PM, so I made a reservation even as we raced back to the car.

The Trailhead Ranch looked more than a little ramshackle as we pulled in, but the horses were healthy and well-groomed. Ann, the sole proprietress, was assisted by foreign students, Justine from France, Jessica from Germany, and a handsome unnamed British boy. The real beauty of the seasonal staff was strangely anachronistic against the general disarray of the place.

The kids were provided with mandatory helmets and boots, and we joined another group of neophyte riders waiting to go out. As the largest and seemingly most experienced rider, I was mounted on Max, an imposing cross between a quarter horse and a Clydesdale. Baby Girl rode Kahlua, a full-sized horse, and Short Pants was on Amigo, an overfed but amiable pony.

Those Johnston Kids were first in the line of riders, right behind Ann, our guide. Ann led Amigo on a rope, but Baby Girl rode her horse like a real cowgirl. I rode last in the line of clients because Max, being young and irrepressible, like me, had a tendency to rouse the other horses and break the line, like me. Justine brought up the rear behind me, which gave me a chance to practice my French. She said my accent wasn’t bad.

The ride took us about 90 minutes. It was just a trail ride, but the horses were spirited enough that it was still interesting. I’ve been on trail rides where the mounts are practically sleeping as they plod along the same route they’ve covered a thousand times before. Those Johnston Kids loved the ride and spent a long time after communing with their horses and feeding them apples while I chatted with the voluble Ann. Nice lady, but I don’t think she gets a lot of company out there. We may drop in on the Trailhead Ranch again on our way back east.

Back in Wasagaming, we secured a campsite (pull-through, yay!), and that was the end of our adventures for that day. I will update with pictures when we have electricity. We’re off-grid for now.

Those Johnston Kids have family in Winnipeg. After our brief visit of the RAMWC we went to visit Aunt Maria. Maria is my ex-sister-in-law and mother to Thalia, my niece and cousin to the kids. Maria and I puzzled over how to describe each other in conversation and settled on ex-in-laws, while our kids should call us Aunt and Uncle. Modern relationships are so complex.

We had come in from the wilderness, but unfortunately Thalia had run off to one somewhere. She was gone camping for the week, but we enjoyed a night’s stay with Maria in any case. Short Pants and Baby Girl were looking forward to a ‘real bed’ and seemed to welcome the respite from my camp cooking. They gorged on the Chinese food we had for dinner (for the record, I think my cooking is pretty good). Maria and I stayed up late gossiping and chatting with her sister and sister’s husband. What does that make them to me? Ex-sister-in-law once removed? While the grown-ups talked, Those Johnston Kids watched cartoons with manic intensity. We don’t even have television at home so they were a bit glassy eyed by bedtime.

The next morning we went for breakfast in the cultural centre of Winnipeg, the Forks. The Forks is the area of town where the rivers Assiniboine and Red River meet. Indigenous people have been meeting at the forks of the rivers for thousands of years to conduct trade, perform ceremonies, and gather socially. Today, the Forks is used in much the same way, with lots of gathering areas, restaurants, and performance spaces. It’s pretty cool.

If you go, be sure to visit the memorial for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women. We did. It was important and moving. I have other thoughts as well though. First, I am reluctant to call it a memorial because that implies a thing in the past, when it fact the crisis continues today. Indigenous women are valued less than the women of some other races in Canadian society, most pointedly the dominant one. That. Must. Stop. Second, the crisis now has its own title MissingandMurderedIndigenousWomen, which tends to be said all in rush like one word, or MMIW. This is also dangerous from an awareness perspective because it could mean that the issue is on the verge of becoming part of the background noise of society again. Labels and boxes are convenient ways to organize newly discovered issues, but after a time those convenient wrappings also begin to conceal the seriousness of the issue contained. I worry that once the public has contained this crisis inside a box labelled MMIW, it will become easy for politicians to refer to it as a undifferentiated piece of their platform, rather than as the combined horror of individual ruined families and lives. We need to keep this on the minds of the public, but with as many different stories as there are words to tell them.

That was what I thought anyway. Then we went to the culturally appropriate site of the Pancake House for breakfast.

After a gluttonous and decadent first meal, we strolled the Forks for a bit. The kids found a baby sparrow. It was flightless, either due to injury or infancy, and they cooed and fussed over the poor thing for a while. I assured them, as parents must, that the bird would be fine, and that we should return it to its natural habitat to rest. With a bit of time to recover, the bird would wing its way to the sky and freedom. I hoped I was right, but odds are the little dodo was ready to rejoin the circle of life.

We are all doomed to certain death. Against the timeline of the existence, even the longest life is less than an eyeblink, infinitesimal and meaningless. Where a brief spark comes into being against astronomically improbable odds, that life is subject to  the random cruelties of fate and the crushing hand of an impersonal universe. We needed a quick distraction. Candy or trains, or a candy train. We found such a distraction. Oh yes, we did.

We were also reminded that what gives meaning to human lives, above all, is other people. We remind each other with respect, caring, love and even candy, that we are all worthy parts of the same circle. Don’t forget.

There we were, sitting in the parking lot of the Mint, planning our next step, a visit to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police museum. It’s also the location of an RCMP training academy. My searches kept turning up addresses in Regina for some reason. All I could find in Winnipeg was a detachment. After puzzling over it for several minutes, I realised what you already know: the museum and academy are in Regina. Face palm.

That left us with some time to fill. We were torn between trains and planes, but settled on the Royal Aviation Museum of Western Canada. I’m not sure what you have to do to get a ‘Royal’ sobriquet, but it sounded fancy. Getting from anywhere to anywhere in Winnipeg was a challenge because they’re currently rebuilding every damn road in the city. I exaggerate, but it felt that way. It’s really only major arteries, connecting streets, parking lots on those streets, any avenues connected to those streets, plus any streets that have names containing the letters E, S, or T. We were thrilled to get to the airport and find a half-block of open road where I could really open her up.

The two museum staff were both genial and prickly, which I thought was a pretty neat trick, normally only found in European wait staff. We were literally the only visitors in the place so it can’t be because they were too busy to deal with us. I think I was because we showed up with an hour to closing time and they had been hoping to duck out early.

The museum is a hangar at the Winnipeg airport, literally packed with aircraft and parts. To make the best use of space, smaller planes are tucked under the wings of larger planes. Tiny craft are crammed into the cargo holds of carriers. There are engines, both rotary and jet, everywhere. I thought the content was pretty fascinating, but Those Johnston Kids were more excited by playing tag in and around the displays. When you think about it though, games in a hangar full of abandoned aircraft is actually pretty cool. The RAMW should be hosting club nights and zombie scenarios.

A major disappointment with the museum, for me as a maker and Those Johnston Kids as, well, kids, is the lack of interaction. It’s like an airplane hobbyist’s display of models that are meant to be appreciated by sight only, except the models are all giant. We wanted to touch things and climb inside the aircraft to have a look around, but sadly little of that is allowed.

We rolled into Winnipeg on July 8. Our first stop was the Royal Canadian Mint, one of two in Canada. The Winnipeg Mint makes circulation coins – the change in your pocket – including the 50 cent piece which is produced for collector sets, but not generally circulated.

Obviously there is security out the whazoo (that’s a lot), so we can’t show you any pictures from the inside. The tour is quite cool though. They can make millions of coins per day, and even make coins under contract for other countries without their own mints. A flag is erected in the drive for every nation that contracts the Mint. In the boutique you can buy coins and souvenirs, although most of the coins for sale are the precious metal variety, produced in Ottawa. Those Johnston Kids bought some souvenirs and we received brand new coins in our change, that were so new they had never left the building. Shiny!

Also interesting was the real solid gold bar on display in the boutique. The bar had it’s own armed guard, a giant of a man, even to me, with tattoos up both arms. He was very affable though and surprisingly knowledgeable about gold and the Mint. The bar is chained down but you are welcome to heft it and feel the prodigious weight of the thing: 23 pounds. Yes, in imperial units. Sigh.

In any case, it was amusing to contrast the difficulty of lifting one solid gold bar with movie representations of people stuffing bags with them and running off. Simply not possible. I could probably carry 8 at a walk with some difficulty. With a good pack, I think I could jog with 4, but not for long. I might be able to actually run flat out with one. That’s all you’d need though. The one bar was worth about half a million dollars.

With a box of expensive worthless rocks in the back, we headed west from Thunder Bay. Ordinarily, Those Johnston Kids have little patience for long drives, but they elected to bypass our planned stop at Sandbar Provincial Park and find a campsite further on. I think they were anxious to get to Winnipeg and civilization.

After a long drive we arrived at Rushing River Provincial Park in the evening. The kids took their bikes to explore a bit while I set up camp and started dinner. We were in the RV section of the campground, but a clan of rednecks had discovered the strategy of camping with the vehicles on a serviced site, and had pitched their tents next door. While the RVers were respectful of others’ quiet enjoyment of the campground, the rednecks circled their fire until 1 in the morning, drinking beer and telling the most horrid and racist stories. There is a dark side to sleeping in the woods with strangers.

So if you’ve been doing that, you know, stop.

We woke up before the reprobates, naturally, and in the pouring rain. We hurriedly folded up camp, with lots of yelling and hilarity as we soaked ourselves. I felt not a whit sorry for disturbing the people next door. The park in daylight is lovely, and we almost wished we could stay longer. Then the mosquitoes noticed us and that wish evaporated. We happily took our leave and turned our sights to beautiful and cosmopolitan Winnipeg.

On my way to see Those Johnston Kids! I spent the last couple of days preparing the Johnston B&B for Alison:

Now I sit at the airport, absurdly early for my flight because that’s what happens when you’re not travelling with Those Johnston Kids…and their father.

We see this sign frequently and we’ve come to realize that it’s a warning. At first we thought it was just your typical schoolyard warning, but then we noticed the extra head. This thing is chasing a cranium exactly like his own, but smaller.

Those Johnston Kids explained that it was a zombie dad playing with it’s young. Literally.

The next morning we made use of the KOA’s Kountry Kitchen (I am not making this up), a covered dining gazebo with a couple of built-in stovetops and sinks, and a toaster. That toaster was gold. It’s the little things you miss.

They were also totally stocked with beach balls. They got that beach ball thing covered.

After a warm breakfast and a hot shower in the clinically clean KOA Kleaning Kabin, we felt quite ready to take on the day. KOAs, and RV campgrounds in general, are relatively peaceful places. The RV crowd is typically older and more established, likely owing to the cost of rolling an RV in the first place. They’re more likely to be sipping wine than beer on their mobile decks, and they tuck in early. Sometimes they have kids, but the kids would rather be watching TV inside in protected comfort than battling flying insects around a campfire. My advice: for a quiet camping weekend, spring for an RV spot and pitch a tent.

We sped right back to the Panorama Amethyst Mine that we had passed the day before. Panorama charged us something like $8 per person, half price for kids, just to come in and hear the tour. The tour was a brief walk around the premises with a guide explaining the history and activities of the mine. I was expecting a tunnel descending into Hades, but the mine is really just a large gully that’s been dug out over decades as they carve the amethyst out of the granite.

Afterwards, if you’re inclined, you can go poke around in their tailings pile, and look for interesting rocks. You won’t find any great amethyst, I can assure you. The rocks on the tailings slope are the cast offs from the mine operations. There is a great deal of crystal, but it’s all been chipped or cracked or shattered. To the amethyst industry, it’s all worthless. On the other hand, you get a sense of accomplishment at having ‘discovered’ a stone of your own. It may not be pretty, but you feel an investment in it nonetheless. Sorta the way you feel about your significant other, I guess.

I’ve been to Panorama twice and I’ve never actually seen anybody doing any mining to produce the tailings, so I’m wondering when they do it. Perhaps they have gnomes that only appear at night. Also, despite the relative worthlessness of any stones you want to keep, you still have to pay for it at $3/lb. Again with the imperial units. The metric system has not come to northern Ontario. Or perhaps it can’t be translated into  gnomish.