Well, it's the first day of my vacation. As usual when I'm leaving town, I get antsy the night before and don't get as much sleep as I should before I leave. No different this time.
At MSP, I'm flying out of gate A-8. Concourses A & B are the new ones that are in a satellite building at the airport, so it's a pretty long haul. As I'm checking my bag, the woman at the counter says You're leaving from A-8. That's in Mendota Heights.
and she's not far wrong. You have to walk midway down terminal C and then catch a shuttle-bus out to A. And 8's about in the middle of A, so there's even more walking to be done. Oh well. I've got plenty of time, so there's no worry.
The security checkpoint goes smoothly. There's no line at all, and the only hassle is finding enough hands to show the laptop, dig out the boarding pass, and put my keys into the bag, all at the same time. Good thing there wasn't a line behind me. It's kinda odd, but as I'm walking toward the concourse, the other security checkpoint I pass has a huge line, and fuming people. Guess it pays to look for the shortest line, eh?
There's a new Tom Clancy / Jack Ryan book (Red Rabbit) out as I'm wandering through the airport. I've read most of the Jack Ryan books while flying, and I take this new book, after a fairly long hiatus, to be a sign that it was time for me to be travelling again.
Concourse A also has the standard announcements, but the female voice giving them has a vaguely British accent. Or maybe it's Canadian? I think A handles mostly the smaller airlink flights, many of which are headed to Canada. Dunno. The woman at the gate has the same accent, so maybe she's just the lucky one who got to record the announcements.
At the gate, I discover they're looking for folks to volunteer to take the 1430 flight, rather than the 1110 that we're waiting for. Apparently the flight is oversold, but she gets a few volunteers right away. Seems I'm flying with a band of some sort, since a lot of them are carrying musical instruments, and a fair number seem to know each other.
While sitting at the airport, I ponder the reality of taking notes on paper, for eventual transcription for the web, vs. typing them right into the computer. I think I actually like writing on paper more. The advantages? When you're travelling, a notebook is lighter and has no boot time. But I'll eventually have to transcribe the notes (and fill in a lot of blanks, since I tend to write on paper in sentence fragments) and my hand isn't used to writing anymore. I just don't do enough of it, and holding a pen feels unnatural now.
Time passes...
Arriving in Canada, I finally talk to one of the musicians. Turns out they're James Brown's band, and he's playing tomorrow night. I'm not sure whether I want to look into tickets or not, since they're pretty expensive (CAD30-60). Then again, I'm not sure what the exchange rate is, so maybe that's cheap. Cigarettes are around CAD10 per pack here, so looked at that way, it's pretty cheap.
Arriving in Winnipeg, my hotel (The Carlton Inn) isn't bad. It's not great, but it's not bad. It used to be a Best Western, but hasn't for a couple years. The lunch special in the attached restaurant comes in just over CAD10, including tip, which seems pretty reasonable.
Winnipeg was built on two rivers. It's served as a handy meeting point for at least six thousand years. And the two winding rivers meeting made for multiple street grids once two railroads met here and made it a big concern. It's not the sort of thing that much matters when you're travelling by foot, though. The grids aren't that wildly different, and the area I'm wandering is all within a mile or so of my hotel. I'm not much worried about getting lost.
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| The Manitoba Legislative Building |
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After checking in and getting some lunch, I went for a walk. I figured I'd walk down Carlton toward the Assiniboine, where the Dalnavert Museum is located. But it's a Monday, so most of the tourist attractions aren't open. Oh well, I'll continue to the Manitoba Legislative Building, which anchors one end of the Assiniboine RiverWalk. Of course the building's under construction. That seems to be another theme when I travel, but it's probably due to travelling outside peak tourist season. Walking around the city while most of the touristy things are closed is kinda nice too. I get a chance to orient myself with little pressure to "run around seeing things". I guess I'm trying to say that it makes it easier to slow down enough to actually see.
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| Along the Assiniboine |
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Walking along the Assiniboine and the Red, a lot of it feels like parts of the Mississippi. There's not a big gorge, but there's enough of a valley that most of the buildings are a fair distance from the river. And a good number of them have turned their backs on it. I suppose this is a common thing in towns that grew next to rivers and then had most of the former river traffic move to the railroads when they went through.
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| Cathedral St. Boniface |
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It was unseasonably warm today, too. 26 degrees. And it's supposed to be 28 tomorrow. Guess that's early fall in the middle of the continent. The jet stream wobbles about, and sometimes we get awfully warm weather.
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| Cathedral St. Boniface |
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I'm thinking about travelling alone, too. It's been quite a while since I've done it. It's very different than what I'm used to. I like being able to take things at my own pace and just stop and jot down some thoughts if that's what I feel like doing. Or if my feet are getting tired from walking, I can stop and sit a bit. But it's nice having someone to travel with, too. I'm starting to suspect that I'll be feeling pretty alone by the time this vacation is over. Then again, that's not all that different from everyday life. There are weeks when I only talk to one or two people on more than a perfunctory level.
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| The Nutty Club |
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Something about the Red River seems pretty different. It took me a few minutes, but then I realized that it runs to the north. That's pretty unique in rivers within North America, and even through I spent some time growing up in Fergus Falls, which is in the Red River watershed, the river there (the Ottertail) flowed either south or west. It's pretty odd and almost threw off my sense of direction until I figured out what was wrong.
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| Government of Canada building |
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I didn't think too much of it at the time, but the fact that Claritin is over the counter here is pretty darned nice. It's not that cheap (comparable in price to Tavist in the states), but it's nice having the option to buy an anti-histamine without any sleepy side-effects without a prescription. In spite of Canada being more socialist than the US, they manage to make drugs available much more quickly.
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| The Fort Garry Hotel |
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Continuing my walk back to the hotel, I walk past the Fort Garry Hotel. It looks pretty fancy. It's not listed in the AAA guide, but it sure looks like a nice place to stay if you've got the dough. Uniformed bellhops, doormen, etc., and a big old building.
Other observations today:
- It seems Manitoba's got a helmet law. Saw a guy riding a motorcycle with what looked like a plastic yarmulke. Mandatory helmet laws are the only reason I know of for people to wear helmets like that.
- Bright yellow sports car zooming down the street with big bass? Here, as in Minneapolis, it's almost certainly got two Japanese guys, early 20s at the oldest, and they probably have bleached-blonde hair.