We decided to take a short road trip to southern Manitoba – our first time in this Canadian province! – for my birthday this year.

While our move to South Dakota a couple weeks prior didn’t leave me with tons of planning time, I did map out a four-day itinerary that included spending a couple days in Wasagaming to hike in Riding Mountain National Park, a day in Winnipeg, and an afternoon in Bismarck, North Dakota, before heading south and home to Rapid City.

We set off early for the Canadian border, made good time on our drive, had an uneventful crossing, and spent the night in Brandon before heading north to Wasagaming the morning of my birthday.

That’s when things fell apart.

The weather was great so we set out to do some hiking in Riding Mountain National Park but ended up aborting our first hike due to the prolific mosquito population along our planned trail. That was fine – we decided to check out a second trailhead and headed north through the park only to discover that the clutch had started to go out in the car.

Through a combination of engine shifting and rolling through stop signs where there was no traffic, Brian was able to limp us back into town where we spent the following day calling around for parts (there were none), exploring a handful of things we could access via foot from in town, and canceling our hotels and plans for the rest of the trip. The following morning, we high-tailed it home so Brian could start wrenching on the car.

Despite the unfortunate change of plans, we did get a small taste of southern Manitoba this trip, and I thought it was worth sharing a few of the highlights in a short post.

Highlights of Wasagaming, Manitoba

The Lakehouse

Given we had a little more time in our accommodations than planned, I was so glad I had splurged on the Lakehouse, which is a boutique hotel just steps away from Clear Lake right in the middle of the main strip of shops and restaurants in Wasagaming.

Our room was clean and comfortable, the contactless check in/out was convenient, and there was a great restaurant and coffee shop on the ground floor and an awesome outdoor lounge just outside our door on the second floor. I would definitely stay and eat here again.

Riding Mountain National Park

Sadly, although Riding Mountain National Park was the focus of our trip, it we ended up being the place we were able to explore the least thanks to the car issues.

We did get to pop in the visitor center in downtown Wasagaming, which had a nice little museum and very friendly staff who helped us with maps and hiking recommendations.

While we didn’t get to do the hikes we picked out, we did have a harried drive via the east entrance gravel road back to Wasagaming once we identified our car issues, and along the way we got to see the historic entry.

I can’t wait to come back to this area – maybe in the fall when it’s cooler and there are fewer bugs! – so we can explore more of the national park.

Clear Lake

Wasagaming sits along the aptly named Clear Lake. The silver lining of being stuck in town was that we ended up exploring two trails that ran along the lake shore in either direction from downtown Wasagaming.

The trail heading west was a bit primitive and took us past boat docks and through a fair amount of vegetation (and bugs!) to some pretty views of Clear Lake to our north and South Lake to (you guessed it) our south. Although we weren’t prepared to photograph them, we spotted three white pelicans at our turnaround point.

The second trail heading east was very well maintained with large rocks all along the shoreline. It was sunny mid-morning and there were more people than I expected out walking their dogs, bicycling, kayaking, and stopping to visit with one another. You could really see the bottom of lake along this section and our turnaround point was a busy little beach full of families.

It was certainly not the trip I had planned, but it was great to finally visit Manitoba. If there was anywhere to be stranded for a day, I’m glad it was beautiful and relaxing Wasagaming where we attempted to embrace the lake life and enjoy the moment once we realized our trip was going to come to an early close.

Hopefully someday we can head back to Manitoba and finish out the rest of our itinerary!