Bless you, North.
Those of you who've been reading my journal since I moved out here to northern Saskatchewan are familiar with my endless rantings about how much it sucks to be up here and my occasional ones as to why its awesome up here.
This is one of the latter entries.
We went to the beach yesterday with one of James's classmates from his course in La Ronge (and her son and a little boy they take care of). We drove for an hour to get to Buffalo Beach (Sand Dunes park but no one really calls it that). When you get there you park your car, walk though a small picnic area (complete with changing rooms and the worlds grossest outhouse), across a wooden bridge and onto this soft, white sand. It feels so good on your feet. The lake itself is shallow for quite a ways out and is actually deeper than the lake just outside my backyard. The water was clear and free of rocks. There were some floating weeds near the shore but once you got past those it was perfect.
The best part? We were the only people there. A couple people showed up at one pointm snapped some pictures of the area and left, but besides that it was just the seven of us. We would have been happier without the wasps buzzing around, but it was still wonderful.
We were talking about it and concluded that anywhere else in the world that entire beach would have bene pakced at pretty much all times of day. The north of this province is so sparsely populated that the beaches aren't really packed, especially not the ones you have to drive to. The beach on the local reserve is often packed but its a walk for most people on the reserve. The beaches here in town? There aren't many but they still get used.
Given the number of lakes this far north, its not really surprising to find empty beaches. For those of you who live in Canada and want a beach vacation? Poke me and I'll tell you where the camp grounds are up here. There's at least three near me. Four if you count the place the school holds its yearly fishing camp (not going up there again as it nearly destroyed my car AND my mom's van).
Because wow. This is awesom.
This is one of the latter entries.
We went to the beach yesterday with one of James's classmates from his course in La Ronge (and her son and a little boy they take care of). We drove for an hour to get to Buffalo Beach (Sand Dunes park but no one really calls it that). When you get there you park your car, walk though a small picnic area (complete with changing rooms and the worlds grossest outhouse), across a wooden bridge and onto this soft, white sand. It feels so good on your feet. The lake itself is shallow for quite a ways out and is actually deeper than the lake just outside my backyard. The water was clear and free of rocks. There were some floating weeds near the shore but once you got past those it was perfect.
The best part? We were the only people there. A couple people showed up at one pointm snapped some pictures of the area and left, but besides that it was just the seven of us. We would have been happier without the wasps buzzing around, but it was still wonderful.
We were talking about it and concluded that anywhere else in the world that entire beach would have bene pakced at pretty much all times of day. The north of this province is so sparsely populated that the beaches aren't really packed, especially not the ones you have to drive to. The beach on the local reserve is often packed but its a walk for most people on the reserve. The beaches here in town? There aren't many but they still get used.
Given the number of lakes this far north, its not really surprising to find empty beaches. For those of you who live in Canada and want a beach vacation? Poke me and I'll tell you where the camp grounds are up here. There's at least three near me. Four if you count the place the school holds its yearly fishing camp (not going up there again as it nearly destroyed my car AND my mom's van).
Because wow. This is awesom.