From the Honeyberry Farm, we had about two hours of farm fields and anticipation before we reached the exalted Canadian border. The border control officer’s question, “are you students?” left us in slight disarray as we realized….no. We’re not. We’re just broke kids running away from our country-in-turmoil for a while. We told him we’d just graduated and that seemed to suffice. Yet, due to Canadian laws, my newly acquired pepper spray was then confiscated. I didn’t care.

Manitoba meant kilometers per hour, liters of gas, and….more fields. But it was Canada, so we had no complaints. After a couple hours of nothing, the outskirts of Winnipeg suddenly emerged and we reveled in the sight of civilization. The hostel we booked for the night, La Cabane Guesthouse, was right on a main road next to some cute neighborhoods. We were welcomed by the smiling owner, Dominique, and given many recommendations for our one day in the city.

Once we got settled in our mixed 4-person room, we found a route to the nearest laundromat: a 25 minute walk past the water and lovely church gardens. This was our first opportunity to use Canadian money and it resulted in asking the nice laundromat-worker-guy to choose the required coinage from the stash in my hand.

We threw our heavy bag of clothes in the washer, walked 25 minutes past strip malls, bus stations, restaurants and a big bridge to the Forks. The Forks used to be horse stalls but is now a hip building full of food, shops and buskers. We ogled at the numerous organic and vegetarian options, bought a cheese bread, and walked back to switch our laundry. We decided to wait at the laundromat until it was dry, at which point this conversation occurred:

Me: “Hello, what is your wifi?”

Nice laundromat-worker-guy: *puts down the laundry he was folding and walks out from behind the counter over to me*

“The network is called MarionLaundry, and the password is really long and hard. Let me know when you’re ready.”

Me: “Oh, okay…I’m ready.”

Him: “It’s marionlaundry.”

Me: …

Him: …

Me: haha………thanks.

Him: *goes back behind the counter to fold laundry*

After walking all the way back to the car with our laundry, we decided to check out the Exchange District – one of Dominique’s recommendations. It was a bit of a walk, but we finally decided to eat at a place called King’s Head Pub. A large man at the door asked for our IDs which was a momentous occasion in and of itself as Claire was approved to drink! 18 is the legal age in Manitoba and this was celebrated very responsibly with a ginger beer and a tiny bit of gross free vodka.  Claire took the first opportunity to order some classic Canadian poutine, and I ordered some vegetable curry with naan. Rather un-pub like, but delicious.  

On our walk back to the hostel, we passed some big windows displaying beautiful landscape paintings and realized there was an event with the local artist. We walked in, breathed in the diffused essential oils, and pretended to be classy in our t-shirts and sandals as we perused the artwork, some of which displayed scenes from our home state of Minnesota. A little later, we looked across the street to see a few people on the patio of a restaurant singing drunkenly and waving us over. We waved and laughed and kept walking.

Back at the hostel, we met Klara, who was from the Czech Republic and working at the hostel. We also realized the other bed in the room was taken by an older man, probably in his 60s. He was from New Zealand and had been traveling around the US by bus for three months. People are cool. It was a little weird, but he was nice and we all kept to ourselves.

Coffee and parfaits were already prepared when we went to the kitchen for breakfast. A good start to the day. We walked to the Forks where we enjoyed some more coffee and wandered the shops. It was extremely hot, but we still managed to walk along the river and through a string of parks. We had one last stop at a cute cafe for an iced coffee before we decided it was time to head to the next farm.

We loved Winnipeg and were semi-dreading going to the next farm since our previous experience was not our cup of tea. The two hour drive through canola fields felt extremely long and boring, but as soon as we pulled up and saw a guitar-clad WWOOFer sitting on a picnic table, we knew it would be okay.