Qu'Appelle Valley

A must do trip when in Saskatchewan is to go to the Qu'Appelle valley. Approximately a 45 minute drive east of Regina. It took us two attempts to get there. Firstly, i believed it to be on the way to Moose Jaw, so off we headed, only to discover we were going WEST instead of east. Upon arriving back in Moose Jaw, i broke down, pulled into a garage, bought a map. I know its a guy thing to think we can make our way around anywhere without asking for directions but this time i knew i had gone wrong. Purchasing the map, and a cost of $5.20 proved in the long run to be invaluable. Opening the map i discover i was way off base, should have been east instead of west, and settled on the return trip with getting the the valley.

Now straightened out, our second attempt should prove successful, after all, we now have a map. We head out, again, for the Qu'Appelle valley, assured we would get there, got onto the main highway, only to discover instead of going east, we were headed NORTH. No problem here because all we had to do was find an exit, take it and go back. Of course once your on the freeway those exits are far and few between, but, we did finally make it. We arrived in the valley, actually we ended up at Fort Qu'Appelle. A quaint village. Drove around a bit, had lunch gassed up. While gassing up i asked the attendant, "where's the fort?" I was expecting an old fort, or at least the remnants of one. The look on this guys face was a puzzle. He just shrugged his shoulders, said we were in Fort Qu'Appelle and in fact, there was no fort. I couldn't believe it. No fort in Fort Qu'Appelle? Oh well, the gas was less there than in Regina so was that a bonus? Further driving led us through the valley and it was beautiful, the leaves starting to turn. We somehow got off the main road, ended up on a gravel road, which seemed to cut through the farms and with luck, found our way back onto the main highway, ALL WITHOUT USING A MAP!!. I guess the bonus was, coming upon some old farm building, seeing more of the country and having a great road trip.