9-17 to 9-19 Greenwater Lake Provincial Park

Sunday 9-17-2017

We had a super Sunday. We have been in Canada for 13 days and are having a great time. Today was another traveling day. We drove about 200 miles.

As we were leaving Prince Albert National Park we saw a few elk. A cow and calf were grazing in the trees at the campground. They didn't seem to mind us watching them and taking pictures. When we drove around the corner a bull elk was standing in the road. We stopped and waited for him to walk across the road, we didn't want to bother him. He walked into the trees and found a tree to pick on. He rubbed his antlers on the tree to clean them and rubbed them so hard he pulled the tree down. When he finished taking the tree down he continued his grazing. This was so cool. I was so excited I forgot to video the scene. We were going to drive through the rest of the park but you had to go down a gravel road so we decided to pass. As we were going to the entrance gate we saw a gorgeous gray fox. This was the first time we have seen one in the wild. He was too far away to get a picture.

The calf we saw 

The bull standing in the road

The cow grazing without a care in the world

Once we were out of the park we continued on our adventure to the next destination. When we got to Melfort we stopped and filled the Minnie with gas. Then we stopped by a Dollar Tree to see if they had the Lance cookies we like but they didn't. While we were parked we decided to have lunch.

After lunch we continued down the road. The drive was back through fields and fields of farmland. I napped during the drive. One time when I was awake Larry pointed out a beautiful red fox looking across a field. We were going fast and someone was behind us so didn't get a chance to get a picture. It was a little weird considering it was noon and we thought it was late in the day for the fox to be hunting.

We arrived at Greenwater Lake Provincial Park around 2:30 and the office was closed. We went into the Lakeshore campground and found a site. It's a beautiful campground with a lot of trees at each site and all of the sites are pull throughs with power. After setting up the Minnie we decided to walk around and find the hiking trails. We were having a hard time figuring out where they were so Larry asked a lady who was walking, she told us there was a trail that went to the playground and another campground. She also said there was a trail that went through the trees. We thanked her and found the trailhead. There were two loops and we choose the longer loop which was about 3 miles. The trail took us around a marsh where beavers live. There were signs through out the trail that talked about the beavers, wildlife in the park and the plants. We hiked across the marsh by wood bridges. We hiked up and down small hills. We had a very nice hike. On the way back to the campground we walked by the day area where there was a marina, playground, beach and a picnic area. The park has a laundry and grocery store but they were closed for the season. During the on season you can play mini-golf, tennis, baseball, horse shoes and swim on the beach. By the time we got back to the campground we had walked around for a couple of hours and walked five miles. We spent the evening relaxing.  

Entrance sign to Greenwater Lake Provincial Park

A bridge to cross the marsh

The marina

Some Canadian Geese landing on the lake

Monday 9-18-2017

We woke up to a brisk 34 degrees and had breakfast. We hung around the Minnie until the sun came out and started to warm things up. About 9:00 we decided to go for a walk. We started the walk by going to the office to pay for three nights. The lady was busy helping a gentleman who was paying for permits to hunt deer and elk. She acknowledged we were there and asked if she could help us. We told her we wanted to pay for our site. We weren't in any hurry so she finished up with the gentleman. He was very friendly. He only had enough money to get two permits, which were habitat permit $15 ($12.15 U.S.) and elk hunting permit $40 ($32.40 U.S.). She told him if he wanted the other one he would have to go online and pay for it. After the gentleman left she helped us. We had a pleasant visit while paying for our site.

Afterwards we continued our walk. We walked around the park to the campgrounds that were closed to see if we could find the snow mobiles trails so we could do a little hiking. We never did find them. The Popular Campground, which was the newest campground was the least impressive campground. All the other campgrounds had a lot of growth but when they built Popular they had logged all the trees out so the only growth on the sites were underbrush. The sites were full-hook ups. We sat at one of the tables and rested. After resting we continued our walk. We were going to walk to the overflow parking area to see if the snow mobiles trails were there. We started walking up hill towards it and decided to head back to our campsite considering my little toe was hurting. I had gotten a blister on it and put a band aid on it but it was still hurting. By the time we got back to the Minnie we had walked 4 miles and for two and a half hours. We had a very nice walk.

Before we sat down for dinner we went for another walk. We were only going to walk around for a little bit but end up walking an hour. We walked down to the lake and a walked around the beach area. While doing this we saw a trail we decided to follow it. The trail was very well maintained and it took us to the other side of the lake. As we walked the trail we had nice views of the lake and walked a little boardwalk that took us through a marshy area of the lake. There were a lot of beautiful homes that look over the lake. We saw people pulling their docks out of the lake by using a small tractor and a winch. They were getting prepared for the winter. When we got to the end of the trail we turned around and walked it back to the beach. The trail back and forth was almost 2 miles. In the beach area there were Canadian geese and sea gulls.  At the marina people were pulling their boats out for the winter. By the time we got back it was time for dinner.

Living on Greenwater Lake

We spent the evening reading and relaxing after another super day of hiking.  

A rainy day

Tuesday 9-19-2017

The rain came in last night and continued through the night. It wasn't a surprise so we spent most of the day inside keeping dry and warm under the heater. It sprinkled on and off all morning. After lunch it had stopped so Larry and I walked down to the dump station and filled our empty water bottles with drinkable water. This gave us an excuse to get out of the Minnie. We took the umbrella with us just in case it started to rain. It was only a five minutes walk there so it didn't take too long. Once we were back we went back to reading our books. After dinner we did another trip to the dump station for more water. As we were walking through we scared four deer out of the trees. They ran across the road and down a road to the right of us and stopped to watch us. When we were going back to the Minnie the deer were still on the road which was a surprise because they usually move on. When we got back to the Minnie we didn't leave again. We had a very relaxing day.