We cross the provincial border into Manitoba and 60 km before Winnipeg we find a great place to swim at a quarry pond with crystal clear water. We would have liked to stay another night, but after our morning swim we were bothered by thousands of flies, so we decide to drive on around midday. MOMO needs another oil change and we find a German mechanic in Steinbach who moved to Manitoba from Bremen a few years ago. He also does an inspection and fixes a few small oil leaks. Thanks to Karin's unsurpassed research, we are once again very lucky to find such a competent garage.

We stay in St Malo Provincial Park for two days, go swimming and go for a bike ride in the surrounding area and have a good time. 

Summertime in the USA and Canada is also the time for rodeos. The cracks from the USA and Canada tour from event to event every week and earn 5-digit dollar amounts depending on their place in the rankings. The biggest event in Canada is the Calgary Stampede, but a week later the circus moves on to Morris in Manitoba. There you see basically the same thing as in Calgary, only everything is a bit smaller and more tranquil. But that doesn't detract from the fun. One thing is certain, it's definitely not for animal rights activists. To ensure that the horses and bulls make real bucking jumps to get rid of the rider, their genitals are tied up with a harness before they are let out of the stall. The event lasts three hours and includes the singing of the US and Canadian national anthems. In the evening there was a chuck wagon race. We had never seen this before and we felt like we were watching Ben Hur in ancient Rome. Three teams of two horses each pull a small two-wheeled cart and go head to head in an approx. 800m long oval. Then come the four-horse teams pulling a small covered wagon. This is even more spectacular. Between the two races, the music choir of the Royal Canadian Mountain Police performs. Around the race there is a folk festival with a Ferris wheel, ghost train and shooting galleries, just like we know it here in Bavaria, except that the girls and boys wear blouses, jeans and cowboy boots instead of dirndls and lederhosen. After the event, a country band plays in the open-air saloon and around midnight we retire to our motorhome, which we can park right next door on a meadow. 

Winnipeg is the capital of Manitoba with 700,000 inhabitants in the surrounding area and we chose Sunday for a city tour. The traffic is manageable and it's easy to find a parking space. In the Canadian Museum for Human Rights with its unusual architecture, the history of the indigenous people is told by contemporary witnesses and the incredible colonial human rights violations to which they have been subjected over the last few centuries are presented in pictures and text. A very worthwhile visit. The city itself is multicultural with a mix of skyline and old buildings and the trendy district of The Folk which has been declared a National Historic Site due to its role as a 6000 year old Native American gathering place.  

We continue through Manitoba past endless fields of grain and farmland. The roads are drawn like a ruler and a bend is announced a few kilometers in advance. The tourist office does its best to highlight the highlights of the region. On the way, we can marvel at the world's largest fire hydrant and the largest tobacco pipe. And then there was a small house with a chapel built from glass bottles and in the village of Holland, how could it be otherwise, there is a windmill. We stay in Spruce Woods Provincial Park for two nights and go on a few bike tours and hikes on the trails in the area. The most interesting is the trail to the Spirit Sand Dunes, a 5 km² desert-like area with fine sand dunes and even cacti. The temperatures there are also 10 degrees higher, with high humidity. The Spirit Sands used to be a sacred site for the Cree Indians. We take a look at the whole thing in the evening when the temperatures are bearable.   

After three relaxing days, we set off on the 800 km journey to Grasslands National Park on the border with Montana/USA. We drive the entire route on well-maintained side roads and soon cross the provincial border into Saskatchewan. Apart from endless fields of grain and agricultural estates, there is a lot of countryside to see. But somehow the whole thing isn't boring, because the huge expanses of land glow in rich colors and there is always something new to look at. The whole thing is only interrupted by oil pumps in the middle of the grain fields.  Almost a quarter of Canada's conventional oil reserves are located in the Prairie Province, which is almost twice the size of Germany. Currently, around 15 % of Canada's oil is extracted there. In the meantime, it has become scorching hot with temperatures that feel like 40 degrees. In Estevan, the largest town on the route, we stop for the night and retire to the air-conditioned public library for a good two hours to put our Ontario travel report online. 

The Grassland National Park consists of two separate parts and lies on the border with Montana. We first visit the smaller eastern block. After the Battle of Little Big Horn, Sitting Bull and 5000 Sioux stayed here from 1876. The flora and fauna is typical prairie landscape with knee-high grass in which five different species of rattlesnake hide. Thank goodness we don't see or hear them, but we do see the only Canadian colony of black-tailed prairie dogs. They look almost like the mouse-sized ground squirrels, but are about twice as big and have a black tail. The next day we drive 180 kilometers to the western part. It doesn't look much different, but it has a herd of bison that was settled here in 2005 and has now grown to over 650 animals. Unfortunately, the area in which they live is 75 square kilometers in size. If you're lucky, you can spot them on a 16km circular trail. With temperatures of over 30 degrees and lots of small mosquitoes and ticks hiding in the tall grass, we did our best, but turned back after 5km and preferred to see the bison at another opportunity in the USA.  

We leave the Grassland National Park, and with it Canada, and cross the border into the USA in the state of Montana at the small town of Val Marie. You'll find out what we experience there in our next travel report.