train voyage part four
it is odd thinking that i have been here in toronto for two weeks now. already i feel like i am home. i still have a few more train-written diaries to catch up on. enjoy!
sunday october 29, 6:40 pm
the beginning of more than 24 hours of ontario
at winnipeg earlier today we had a scheduled stop. i ran out, foolishly forgetting that this would be my last chance to get internets. now all my writing must wait to be posted until i am in toronto. i went out on the street and headed for the big railroad hotel, hotel fort gary. the winds turned me back in very few steps. i nearly got blown over. so back into the train station. it was a union station, old fashioned and built at the same time as the big hotel. marble floors, carved stone. gorgeous.
i bought some postcards, lamented forgetting lappy. and waited. the train was delayed further. they had to take off a car or two, and change the crew. the rest of the station stops have been cancelled, we only pause briefly in each town or city to take on supplies and passengers or drop them off.
i don't know if we will be late getting to toronto or if we will make the time up overnight.
at winnipeg i noticed oaks, it made me happy. alberta has almost no oaks. the elms were all wrapped with sticky paper to try and halt the spread of the dutch elm disease. it must be the eastern front of the disease.
watching the fields and forests for wildlife, i spotted a large buck, next to karen's corner hackers and smackers. i think it was a ball diamond and ice cream stand, but it was difficult to determine exactly what business karen did there.
the red river and the assiniboine meet in Winnipeg. they flood, as we were told.
the land was so flat, and water logged. flatter even than edmonton, where the rivers flow in carved out ravines and valleys. here the river seems to flow right on top of the plain. i can imagine that the whole province of manitoba might flood. i did not see any sign of the great lake winnipeg.
as we left winnipeg, i saw a rock in the grass.
then, an hour or so later, i saw another. it was covered in pastel mint green reindeer lichen. suddenly, there was more and more rock. then i saw it.
a black spruce.
i had made it through the prairie, into the canadian shield.
the ground began rolling, hills and valleys grew up out of the plain.
soon lakes and ponds and huge rock cuts dominated the geography. black spruce and jack pine became dominant over the birch and poplar. there were tunnels, rivers, and lakes. oh the lakes! surrounded in rock, with the big spruce and spruce bogs. they were dotted with beaver lodges. there were waterfalls over rocks, the reindeer lichen became the dominant ground cover. it was beautiful.
the canadian shield is the landscape of my heart.
in a blink we were in ontario. the border is a large friendly white sign in the middle of trees and rock.
lakes with cottages all around them. red canoes. muskeg.
the huge granite rocks! it made me so happy. i just sat and stared out of the window. drank it in. finally, i had left the prairies. finally i was back in the shield. i knew i had a very long stretch of ontario ahead. but it looked and felt like home. the sky had narrowed, the horizon was not flat, or convex, it was rolling and treed. the rocks hugged the tracks and embraced the train. it felt good. the beavers and hawks and the trees.
the hills! the lakes and water.
the narrow sky!!!
it made me so happy.
there were beavers and ducks in the water. i felt sure that there had been loons on each of those lakes earlier in the season. i knew the landscape and it felt like home.
the wind continues. the weather changes rapidly. from sun to rain to snow to cloud to sun again.
tonight i sleep through this so familiar landscape. the shield.
i am happy.
soon i will be in toronto. so soon.
i have completed my special secret gift for daniel. i made him wombat pillowcases. i have been carefully embroidering wombats based on some drawings spacejack made for him. i am very pleased with them, and very happy about this trip.
sunday october 29, 6:40 pm
the beginning of more than 24 hours of ontario
at winnipeg earlier today we had a scheduled stop. i ran out, foolishly forgetting that this would be my last chance to get internets. now all my writing must wait to be posted until i am in toronto. i went out on the street and headed for the big railroad hotel, hotel fort gary. the winds turned me back in very few steps. i nearly got blown over. so back into the train station. it was a union station, old fashioned and built at the same time as the big hotel. marble floors, carved stone. gorgeous.
i bought some postcards, lamented forgetting lappy. and waited. the train was delayed further. they had to take off a car or two, and change the crew. the rest of the station stops have been cancelled, we only pause briefly in each town or city to take on supplies and passengers or drop them off.
i don't know if we will be late getting to toronto or if we will make the time up overnight.
at winnipeg i noticed oaks, it made me happy. alberta has almost no oaks. the elms were all wrapped with sticky paper to try and halt the spread of the dutch elm disease. it must be the eastern front of the disease.
watching the fields and forests for wildlife, i spotted a large buck, next to karen's corner hackers and smackers. i think it was a ball diamond and ice cream stand, but it was difficult to determine exactly what business karen did there.
the red river and the assiniboine meet in Winnipeg. they flood, as we were told.
the land was so flat, and water logged. flatter even than edmonton, where the rivers flow in carved out ravines and valleys. here the river seems to flow right on top of the plain. i can imagine that the whole province of manitoba might flood. i did not see any sign of the great lake winnipeg.
as we left winnipeg, i saw a rock in the grass.
then, an hour or so later, i saw another. it was covered in pastel mint green reindeer lichen. suddenly, there was more and more rock. then i saw it.
a black spruce.
i had made it through the prairie, into the canadian shield.
the ground began rolling, hills and valleys grew up out of the plain.
soon lakes and ponds and huge rock cuts dominated the geography. black spruce and jack pine became dominant over the birch and poplar. there were tunnels, rivers, and lakes. oh the lakes! surrounded in rock, with the big spruce and spruce bogs. they were dotted with beaver lodges. there were waterfalls over rocks, the reindeer lichen became the dominant ground cover. it was beautiful.
the canadian shield is the landscape of my heart.
in a blink we were in ontario. the border is a large friendly white sign in the middle of trees and rock.
lakes with cottages all around them. red canoes. muskeg.
the huge granite rocks! it made me so happy. i just sat and stared out of the window. drank it in. finally, i had left the prairies. finally i was back in the shield. i knew i had a very long stretch of ontario ahead. but it looked and felt like home. the sky had narrowed, the horizon was not flat, or convex, it was rolling and treed. the rocks hugged the tracks and embraced the train. it felt good. the beavers and hawks and the trees.
the hills! the lakes and water.
the narrow sky!!!
it made me so happy.
there were beavers and ducks in the water. i felt sure that there had been loons on each of those lakes earlier in the season. i knew the landscape and it felt like home.
the wind continues. the weather changes rapidly. from sun to rain to snow to cloud to sun again.
tonight i sleep through this so familiar landscape. the shield.
i am happy.
soon i will be in toronto. so soon.
i have completed my special secret gift for daniel. i made him wombat pillowcases. i have been carefully embroidering wombats based on some drawings spacejack made for him. i am very pleased with them, and very happy about this trip.