It is a long ways from Edmonton to Flin Flon but it turns out the northern Manitoba town was the midway of an even more immense journey.
We are making another pilgrimage to Churchill, our first without the girls as they are already working up there. Fenya's boyfriend Bobby is joining us, and has never been to this part of the country before.
Driving up Hansen Lake Road we saw the intimidating residue of quite a few wildfires, and long stretches of dense boreal forest.
We passed a bald eagle and raven sharing a meal of roadkill (maybe a wolverine, based on colouring), and flocks of namesake birds at Pelican Narrows.
All in all, it took about 11 hours of driving to arrive at Flin Flon, but we spotted the immense smelter chimney (251 m, the second highest in Canada until the Inco Superstack in Sudbury is demolished) from perhaps 20 miles out.
With a little time left before bedding down, we took Bobby to see the statue of the town's eponymous character, Josiah Flintabbety Flonatin. I'd forgotten that his look was designed by American cartoonist Al Capp (L'il Abner).
While there, we took notice of a display featuring a large traditional-style canoe, and discovered that an intrepid band of Flin Flonners took this simple vessel from Rocky Mountain House all the way to the Montreal Expo on the year of my birth.
There were ten of them, their names embossed on a metal plaque, who paddled their way across much of this immense nation from May 24 to September 4, 1967. And all to help a young nation observe its very first centennial.
Imagining ten men and all their gear in such a modest craft for such a period of time without the benefit of modern communications was intimidating and inspiring in equal measure.
It also made today's 11 hour drive in air-conditioned comfort seem like much less of an achievement, even though we did cover a province-and-a-half.
(Apologies for the quality of the photos, it was getting late!)
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