Beach Weekend, Volume 2

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 12/08/2010 (5509 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Elk Island Provincial Park
Grand Beach Provincial Park
Patricia Beach Provincial Park

My last trip to northern Manitoba drained my batteries completely. The combination of the seven-hour drive to Paint Lake, the additional full day drive to Pisew and Wekusko falls, and the return trip to Winnipeg, was exhausting. A busy week at work, combined with helping friends paint their new house and visits to several Folklorama pavilions, compounded my travel fatigue.

With the weekend approaching, a decision needed to be made – do I head out west for a weekend of fishing in Duck Mountain Provincial Park, or relax on the east side beaches of Lake Winnipeg?

The strain of the previous weekend made the decision easy: A relaxing weekend at Elk Island, Grand Beach, and Patricia Beach provincial parks was the obvious choice.

One of my travel companions has a cottage at Belair, on the east side of the lake, so we’d have a roof over our heads for a change. The plan was to take advantage of these world-class beaches and the forecast of sun and heat.

Our first stop was Elk Island Provincial Park. Located across from the beach at Sandy Bay, 115 kilometres north of Winnipeg on Highway 59, Elk Island technically isn’t road accessible. A sandbar extends from the southern tip of the island and snakes towards the mainland. Some years, when Lake Winnipeg’s water level is low, the sandbar is fully exposed and connects right to the beach, while in other years a short swim is necessary to get to the island. The water level this year is somewhere in between. We had to wade about 100 metres from the beach to the sandbar, with the water up to my chest — and I’m 6’1”.

The sandbar is a popular spot for boaters. Numerous powerboats and sailboats were moored in the sand, while families suntanned and swam in the warm, shallow water. The carpet of blue-green algae that has plagued neighbouring Victoria Beach had disappeared, so it was safe to swim.

I had visited Elk Island twice before, but had never ventured past the sandbar. After a swim and some lounging, we decided to escape the crowded sandbar and began a hike along the western shore of the island.

Elk Island is quite large, 900 square hectares, with the interior of the island nothing but thick forest and the remains of an old logging camp. The western shore is lined with fine white sand beaches broken up by gigantic boulders and gnarled trees, with roots reaching into the lake. Sand dunes tower above the shoreline. The eastern shore is mostly marshland, providing a home to thousands of shore birds.

The island is a perfect place to get away from the crowds on a sunny afternoon and to have a stretch of beach all to yourself. We found a quiet stretch of sand and spent the afternoon relaxing and tanning, only seeing a couple other people who had also hiked along the shoreline. Elk Island Provincial Park is an excellent alternative to the crowded mainland beaches and has white sand that rivals the sand at Grand Beach.

The next day we headed south from the cottage at Belair to Grand Beach Provincial Park. The park is also one of the original provincial parks, created in 1961, but the three-kilometre stretch of beach has been one of Manitoba’s most popular attractions for almost a century.

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Grand Beach certainly lived up to its reputation, as the west beach was covered with a sea of beach blankets and sun seekers. With limited space available on the west section of the beach, we headed to the quieter eastern end of the beach. There was plenty of room, but unlike the previous day, the sun was nowhere to be seen and a thick layer of clouds had descended on the area.

With no sun to be had, we decided to indulge our inner children at the Thunder Mountain Water Slides, just outside the park gates in Grand Marais. With only four different water slides, Thunder Mountain doesn’t provide the best bang for your buck ($15.50 for a day’s admission), but we still managed to have a lot of fun throwing ourselves down the slides. I’d recommend stopping for an afternoon, if the sun isn’t blazing and you’re looking for an alternative to the beach.

The last stop of the weekend was Patricia Beach Provincial Park, 30 kilometres south of Grand Beach. Patricia Beach offers an alternative to crowds of Grand Beach, fewer people, but the same soft, white sand. As a kid, my family made numerous trips to Patricia Beach, so returning here for the first time in years brought back a lot of fond memories.

We arrived at Patricia Beach just before sundown and the scene at the beach was like something off of a postcard. A few people lounged on the beach, not ready to give up on the last moments of the weekend. The water was like glass, while the sun hung just above the horizon. Patricia Beach is one of those places that makes you appreciate the beauty of Manitoba.

Our relaxing beach weekend was exactly what my friends and I needed to recharge our batteries. I’m ready to head out west to take in all that the Duck Mountain area has to offer.

If you know of any spots or sites that I need to check out in the Duck Mountain/Swan River/Porcupine Hills area, drop me an email at manitoba.atoz@gmail.com or add a comment below.

Parks visited in this week’s post:

 

View A(sessippi) to Z(ed Lake) in a larger map