#2: [23-Aug-02]

19-Jul-2001 -- After successfully completing a pleasant visit to 52N 103W, I set off for the next confluence to the east. I followed Saskatchewan Highway 49 to Norquay, and then turned north on Highway 8. Research with MapQuest had shown that there should be secondary road heading straight east from Highway 8 that runs just 200 meters south of the confluence. Right after crossing the Swan River, I found a gravel road where the bearing to the confluence was 90 degrees, so I turned and followed it.

Just 1.25 km from the confluence, I stopped to photograph what is known on the prairies as a slough – a small, natural body of water, usually shallow and weedy and often containing ducks or other wild waterfowl. I should have been able to guess then that visiting the confluence wouldn’t be as easy as I hoped.

Sure enough, when I reached the point on the road 190 meters due south of the confluence, there was a ditch with about three feet of dirty water and a stretch of swampland between the confluence and me. If I had enough time, I could have circled around from the west. The confluence itself is probably on drier ground in a grove of trees. But I had places to go and a 1000-kilometer day’s drive to finish, and the weather coming up from the west promised rain, so I decided to leave this one for someone else.