Winnipeg, Manatoba, CA

West Winnipeg 24.4C - 75.92F degrees  Bright sunshine.

Guess I am getting a little ahead of myself here.  We spent this last Monday with Gail & Loris Barsanti at Assiniboine Park Zoo (Click Here) in Winnipeg, Manatoba, Canada; and, I started out with some swimming polar bear pictures.

There was one area that had a Plexiglass tunnel through the swimming hole for the bears and was something to watch them swim around us.

Will back up a little and say that we left Princeton, MN where we had visited with Diane & Dick Messer for several days.  On Friday morning we drove to north of Browerville, MN to the farmstead of Doris & Lyle Winter and set up at their back door.  They had been on a few day camping trip with friends and had just been home long enough to pick some strawberries from their garden.

 

We had supper with them Friday evening and then  their friends Gary & Gretta came over and we played Pegs & Jokers.

 Doris and Lyle In front of their house.
We went to Clarissa, MN with Winters and met several of their friends for breakfast in a small local restaurant, drove around some of their area and had lunch with them. 

 Went to a quilt show there in Clarissa -- Phyllis wanted pattern and colors from this bow-tie quilt.

 There was a classic car show going on at the time and we spent some time there; Lyle & Doris visited with many friends.

We took off with our rig then and drove to Thief River Falls, MN Saturday.  Was in some rain; in fact, set up the trailer (without unhooking) in the rain.  It quit promptly when we had the electricity and water hooked up and leveling jacks down!  The people at the RV Park registration desk said we were at the north edge of a Tornado Watch area and showed us where to come into the big building if sirens sounded.  They didn't and the storm went south and east of us.

 Got to Rosser, Manitoba about 12:30 on Sunday.  Parked the rig, without unhooking, in front of Loris's second garage door.

 They live in a very small village west of Winnipeg.

Some very nice roses and tomatoes still in the "water walls" to keep them from the cold weather at nights.

 Went to the Assiniboine Park Zoo in Winnipeg and spent quite a bit of time watching the polar bears.

We spent time in a great butterfly house.  They had many just "hatching" and we got to take them from the chrysalis stage to the next room and watch them open their wings for the first time and finally fly off or latch on to a flower.

Chrysalis

Chrysalis

Monday evening we went to an Italian Restaurant - Paradise near downtown Winnipeg. 

Barsanti's left with their motorhome to go to a lake to the west with several other friends in their camping club for the Canada Day today and fireworks at this place that they have gone to for the last 6 hears with the same group.  We drove some 45 kilometers to a KOA, unhooked and drove downtown to tour the Legislative Building.  Found that they start their guided tours today,

 so we looked around the the "Fork" area--where the Assinaboine River and the Red River come together and there are a lot of shops, bicycle trails and quite a walking bridge. Lots of bikes and walkers.

This morning we took guided tour through the Provincial Legislative Building and then walked quite a distance through a festival on the streets near there.  This is Canada Day and a holiday for many.  Some cafe's open, but most stores closed.  Street and highway crews working, but no government workers, though the building was open with guides.  Drove through the last quarter of Winnipeg we hadn't looked at on the way home.  Stopped at a Subway and had a new sub - real Lobster.  Got the grill out this evening and grilled chicken breasts for supper.  Will hook up in the morning and head for Kenora, Ontario to visit Ellen Belbas for lunch before heading south to International Falls, MN


Later, Lynn