Reunited and It Feels So Wood(en)

I found it very hard to stay away
As we reminisce
On precious moments like this

“Reunited”, Peaches & Herb

I had been planning this trip for months. A fast tour through the southwestern Manitoba grain elevators, making sure to get the endangered elevators at Napinka, Cameron and Lyleton.

A weekend opened up, and I was all set to go on Saturday, June 28. Then.. my father-in law died. Suddenly grain elevators were at the bottom of the priority list.

Here we are a couple of months later. The wound is still pretty raw, but you have to keep on living, right? So I found another Saturday to go, and off I went, on September 6, bright and early.

I like a few Charli xcx songs, but not this one… my car’s Bluetooth picked up my daughter’s phone and started playing it as I got ready to depart.

My plan was to head down highway 2 to Souris, then diagonally southwest through Napinka, have a late lunch in Melita, tag Lyleton, then head straight east through Coulter-Deloraine-Killarney then on highway 3 toward home. It was ambitious but doable in a day.

It worked out pretty well.. although not quite to plan.

I won’t bore you with every elevator that I saw. Along highway 3 there was Starbuck – Fannystelle (old and new) – Culross – Elm Creek (old and new) – Rathwell – Holland – Cypress River (two) – Nesbitt (old and new).

It was 09:15 at Nesbitt, 3.25 hours on the road so far. It was turning out to be a nice day.

After bouncing across the swinging bridge in Souris, I started cutting cross-country, southwest. First stop was Elgin, where I decided to uncase my drone and get a few shots of the grain elevator there, still in use.

This was on the CN Hartney subdivision, which was acquired by the Southern Manitoba Railway and operated for a little while before they ripped up the rails and sold them.

This short wooden trestle is still in place east of the town.

Next up, Hartney, where a KCSM grain hopper sat on the tracks – the CPKC tracks, namely the Estevan subdivision that runs from Kemnay near Brandon, MB through Souris then west into Saskatchewan to its namesake town. I would see a lot of that subdivision.

After that… Napinka.

It took me five and a half hours to get there, but I got there, and those two beautiful grain elevators were still standing.

I took about 120 photos, with my drone, my camera and my phone, over the hour I spent in Napinka. It was worth spending the time to see these prairie sentinels, perhaps for the last time.

I won’t overwhelm you with all the photos. As Inigo Montoya said in The Princess Bride, “No, there is too much. Let me sum up.”

There are two grain elevators in Napinka. One is prominently lettered for Ogilvie Flour, and eventually became the “B” Manitoba Pool elevator. The other is the “A” Pool elevator. Both are in poor shape and abandoned. There have been rumours all year that they will be demolished. So far they are standing, but their days are numbered, especially after someone got stuck inside while trespassing earlier this year.

Both elevators have lost a lot of shingles, and I imagine their structural integrity is, let’s say, compromised. They might look fairly okay at first glance, but there can be a lot of rot that’s not visible.

Note all the shingles scattered around the elevator, blown off by the frequent prairie winds.

After an hour, it was time to go.

Reluctantly, I put everything in the car and drove away, perhaps for the last time.

Onwards.

18 elevators in 12 towns in 6.5 hours. More to come.

Read on – Reunited Part Two