Apparently in Canada, no one needs to get gas in the morning, as no gas station opened earlier than 7am, even in the middle of the city. So instead we went to my favorite fast food restaurant, Tim Horton's, to grab some breakfast grub. I still think Duluth needs one of these.
We gathered this morning at the home of Lorne and Jean, whom are our guides for the trip. Lorne has been doing this trip for 10 years now, so he's very good at planning it. We ended up leaving his house around 8am.
Heres a great explanation of the drive from Winnipeg north about two hours: it is flat.
After that, it starts looking like northern minnesota without the hills. Lots of black spruce and jack pine, and some tamarack and lots and lots of orchids. This is what the trip is about! What we have seen today: cyp parviflorum and pubescens, reginae, rams head, and a platanthera I didn't have a look at because you had to cross a puddle to get there, and they're tiny anyway.
We stopped briefly for lunch at Devils Lake, mawing into that fruit we bought yesterday. Take a look at the carnage!
Our caravan:
We took a side trip down long point, which juts into lake Winnipeg. This is where we spotted the orchids up close, instead of seeing them zipping by while driving (which isn't bad either!)
Here we stopped at an overlook on that Long Point road. It was quite a view! Some folks were squatting here, as there were 2 campers parked there- one looked abandoned, the other very much lived in.
(insert lake Winnipeg photo 53)
We saw some adorable wood lilies here, they were only a foot tall or less.
(insert wood lily pix 54-57)
Josh also felt accomplished since he finally saw a wood lily today- hard to spot when you're red-green color blind. Practically had to grab it for him.
Then we continued further down the road to the end and hit the lake where we saw lots of showies just opening and lots of yellows. We also saw blue eyed grass:
(58)
Columbine:
(66)
And mom and I compared our tans. Guess which one is mine.
Somewhere between Grand Rapids and little limestone lake we pulled off onto another gravel road and found some more neat plants. I should preface that by saying this entire trip is full of neat plants. Even the ugly boring stuff is neat because it's basically on the tundra/muskeg. It's this part of the trip that my dad would have hated. For one, it's hot. You wouldn't think it'd be so damn hot this north, but it was 85°-90° all day. Part of me really hopes it gets cold and stays that way for the duration of the trip.
Anyway, onto the pictures. We stopped along the gravel road and were able to spot small yellows, coralrhizza, picture 74, alpine cotton grass, a bunch of neat little butterflies, and a turtle crossing route. Lots in one spot, huh? Turns out these places we are stopping were just fluke finds on previous trips Lorne and Joan have taken. A "hey let's go see whats down that road" kind of decision. Honestly, you can see most of these orchids along the highway, but it's not quite the same.
Look closely. Do you see the lines going perpendicular across the gravel road? Turtle drag marks! Though I never saw one actually crossing the road, I've made my mind up that that's what it is:
A tuft of alpine cotton grass. The tufts are the size of a nickel. And only about 8-12" tall. Totally adorable. As we went further north, it became more plentiful in the ditches along the highway.
Here is the corallrhiza. They look really ugly from afar:
Until you get up close. Then they get cuter with the little spots on the lip :)
These are also an up-close beauty. Purple with spotted lip, it's very cute.
Hey look, a little butterfly! These were all over the place. Have you ever tried photographing a butterfly? They're notoriously difficult to get to stand still for more than a second.
After that stop, we drove some more. A lot of straight line driving, with the power line corridor right next to you. It can get boring if you don't realize there are really cool plants in the ditch to the right of you! Our last stop before Herb Lake Landing where we are staying the night is Little Limestone Lake. This is called a "marl lake" and has a super calcite content because of the limestone in the area (hence Little Limestone Lake) It looked like we were in the balkans in Croatia, or in the blue seas of the carribean. So cool!!!!
Had to get a couple of shots. It's hard for you to see just how blue it is unless you are there in person. It's quite amazing.
We arrived at Herb Lake Landing, and are staying at Tawow Lodge. A nice place with great little cabins, right on the lake.
Cant beat a view like this:
So it's been a long day. It's 10:08pm and the sun hasn't officially set yet. Tomorrow we head for Thompson where we will finalize our supplies, hopefully grab a geocache or two in town, maybe even get lucky enough to find wifi to publish these two posts from yesterday and today, and then board the train bound for Churchill around 5pm!
Location:Winnipeg to herb lake landing
No comments:
Post a Comment