Yesterday, we drove to Portage la Prairie on a strawberry quest. "U-Pick" strawberry farms thrive in abundance here in Manitoba, and one can buy the berries locally in the height of the season at very reasonable prices. Of course, there are strawberry farms closer to Selkirk, but this was a good excuse to take a drive and see a part of Canada I've never seen.
Portage la Prairie is a city in the Central Plains Region of Manitoba. The name is derived from the French word portage, which means to carry a canoe overland between waterways. In this case the "portage" was between the Assiniboine River and Lake Manitoba, over la prairie.
A testament of French ingenuity, the city was built beside the Assiniboine River, which proceeded to flood it quite regularly and persistently. Remarkably (in what was perhaps destined to be the only documented case in history), the French traders refused to surrender, and stubbernly rebuilt the town just as regularly and persistantly as the river could destroy it. Then one day almost two hundred years later, someone (we presume it was a non-French person) finally thought to dig a floodway to divert the water, thus ending the annual flooding. While the regular floods weren't so good for the development of the town's infrastructure, it had the happy side-effect of making sure the French traders had at least one good wash every year, which likely had a favorable impact on the city's tourism.
Today, the population stands at approximately 13,000. Attractions to Portage la Prairie include depressingly flat land occupied largely of mustard fields, and not much of anything else. Had someone thought of building the floodway sooner, it's quite probable that the people of Portage la Prairie would've had time to think of something interesting to make their town famous. As it was, potatoes sounded like a pretty good idea to the tired and waterlogged Frenchmen, so the town hosts an annual potato festival in August.
For us, though, the best thing about Portage la Prairie is that for $4 a pail you can pick some of the juciest and sweetest strawberries you've ever eaten. And for $6, you can get all of that juicy sweet goodness without having to pick them yourself. It just doesn't get any sweeter than that.
Portage la Prairie is a city in the Central Plains Region of Manitoba. The name is derived from the French word portage, which means to carry a canoe overland between waterways. In this case the "portage" was between the Assiniboine River and Lake Manitoba, over la prairie.
A testament of French ingenuity, the city was built beside the Assiniboine River, which proceeded to flood it quite regularly and persistently. Remarkably (in what was perhaps destined to be the only documented case in history), the French traders refused to surrender, and stubbernly rebuilt the town just as regularly and persistantly as the river could destroy it. Then one day almost two hundred years later, someone (we presume it was a non-French person) finally thought to dig a floodway to divert the water, thus ending the annual flooding. While the regular floods weren't so good for the development of the town's infrastructure, it had the happy side-effect of making sure the French traders had at least one good wash every year, which likely had a favorable impact on the city's tourism.
Today, the population stands at approximately 13,000. Attractions to Portage la Prairie include depressingly flat land occupied largely of mustard fields, and not much of anything else. Had someone thought of building the floodway sooner, it's quite probable that the people of Portage la Prairie would've had time to think of something interesting to make their town famous. As it was, potatoes sounded like a pretty good idea to the tired and waterlogged Frenchmen, so the town hosts an annual potato festival in August.
For us, though, the best thing about Portage la Prairie is that for $4 a pail you can pick some of the juciest and sweetest strawberries you've ever eaten. And for $6, you can get all of that juicy sweet goodness without having to pick them yourself. It just doesn't get any sweeter than that.
4 reactions:
I see a salsa jar! :-D
I see sliced peaches! :-D
Do you see the strawberries?
No, I don't see any strawberries.:-D ha. Next year, we will hopefully have bigger strawberries on our plants. :-)
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