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Wednesday August 16, 2006 5:40 am Lethbridge Alberta Sunrise 6:23 Sunset 8:48 Hours of daylight: 14:25 Day 1 of our trip to Virginia

A. Morning Musings

5:40 am It is + 13 C at the moment, with a forecast high of + 19 C. There is a 60% chance of showers this afternoon. Yesterday we had a late afternoon sprinkle but it barely wet the ground (0.5 mm). We leave this morning for Regina which is about 7 hours away. Phyllis has used a couple of travel websites to plan this trip. We have detailed driving instructions and maps of all the major cities with our intended accommodation marked. Incredible. This will be a new way of travelling for us - I am looking forward to it.

We will stop at MacDonalds for a quick coffee at 7 am (the car lineups at Tim Hortons are likely too long) and then head east on highway 3 to Medicine Hat where we will stop for breakfast. There is a good restaurant at a motel on the east end of the city just beside the trans-Canada highway. Then on to Swift Current, Moose Jaw and finally Regina. It is difficult to have a clear sense of how we will feel today as we adapt to life on the road. Perhaps I will want to do some reading after we get settled in the motel in Regina, perhaps we will want to go for a long walk (and see some birds), and perhaps we will want to rest. Just writing this, I see that we should bring a couple of bird books.

I am going to take a small notebook where I can jot down impressions as we travel so I can add something to this page at the end of the day. Right now (6:13 am) we still have to put our gear in the car. I think that the coffee shops open at 7 am so we need to get our timing right - too early and we will have to wait until Medicine Hat for a cuppa. Now to shut the computer down and start loading up the car.

B. Plan

Drive from Lethbridge to Regina.

C. Actual/Notes

4:50 PM We arrived in Regina at 4 PM. We had no difficulty finding the hotel. It is right downtown and the room is very nice - large and clean. The wireless in the room works perfectly. I tried jotting down a few notes as we drove along (i.e. when Phyllis was driving) and I will now try to create a few comments about the day.

We left the house at 7 am and made a quick stop at Tim Horton's on the west side to fill up two travel mugs with hot coffee. The coffee was very hot and I almost burned myself on the first sip. The sky was overcast and we experienced showers for much of the drive to Medicine Hat. We saw farmers combining their crops and noticed a huge pile of potatoes near one of the potato processing plants near Coaldale. It was a cool morning, enjoyable and refreshing.

We arrived in Medicine hat at 9 am and had breakfast at the Lodge restaurant on the east end of town, where we have eaten before on our trips east. I had a light fluffy waffle with a side order of pork sausages and a nice coffee. The drive was very easy and relaxing. Gasoline in Lethbridge was 115.9, 112.9 in Coaldale and 115.9 in Medicine Hat.

While having breakfast we were able to read the morning Globe & Mail. I became interested in a book review column and began to think about trying to write such a "column" when I finish each book that I read. I am not pleased with the way I end each book by simply listing it as read. The review consisted of 5 paragraphs:

  1. An opening sentence that makes a personal connection between the book and the reviewer.
  2. A few sentences on the author's background and the relation to the story. (try googling the author for information)
  3. A paragraph that focuses on 1 or 2 specific details from the story.
  4. A paragraph that mentions a couple of weaknesses in the story.
  5. A brief summary evaluation of the book.

That doesn't seem too difficult. I really need to force myself to do this. It would be one small step toward providing a richer description of what I am doing and what I think about it. The next step is to continue reading "All the Men are Sleeping". I tried googling "D R MacDonald" author Nova Scotia and found a couple of sites that gave a brief biographical sketch.

The Globe & Mail also contained an article on a Russian mathematician Grigori Perelman who has written a 300 page article on the shape of the universe. Apparently the article was posted in an online archive of mathematics and physics papers. I am curious. Let's see if I can find it. Googling 'Grigori Perelman Russian mathematician "shape of the universe" ' Here is one of the web sites:

http://www2.grioo.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=859&sid=aef39dd3afb4408fca17f0f6a208f6da

We arrived in Swift Current at noon and pulled into a Husky service station for gas. The pumps all had an ethanol blend which had "a 90 rating for the price of an 87". The unit cost was 114.9. The entire trip from Medicine Hat to Swift Current was in showers. It was clear a couple of miles to the north and again to the south, but the highway was right in the middle of a dark front.

Looking at the scenery as we drove along I was struck with the idea of trying to incorporate a couple of oil pumps as well as some round hay bales into my model rail layout. Now to see if they make such a thing. For the oil pump, yes: http://www.walthers.com/exec/productinfo/933-3170 , for the hay bales, yes: http://www.walthers.com/exec/productinfo/189-1212 .

We appeared to be driving along an ancient river valley. There are rolling hills and little sign of human habitation. I love it. From Swift Current to Regina the air was literally full of white cabbage butterflies. Apparently it is so noticeable that it even made the evening news. We stopped off at a bird observation platform at Reed Lake at 1:15 PM. I took a number of photos with my telephoto adapter lens, but even so, the birds were too far away for identification purposes. We did identify the Bonaparte's Gull which was relatively easy because of its black head. I will call that bird #1 for this trip. There were also a number of American White Pelicans but we have seen those many times in Lethbridge.

I am pleased with the results of using the little notebook to make a few comments as we go through the day.

10:50 PM We are back from a very pleasant visit and reunion with Hanna and now have a good sense of the next couple of days. Tomorrow we will visit Moose Jaw, about 40 minutes from Regina. There are a few local sites of historical interest and we will have a retired history teacher as a guide. Then on Friday Phyllis and Hanna will focus on some genealogy research. Saturday we will continue our trip south and east and into the United States.

Rolling hills in south-western Saskatchewan
Trans-Canada highway
Hay bales
Head-end of potash unit train

 

D. Reflection