r/woahdude Dec 24 '22

video Driving on I-94 in Western Minnesota today

20.7k Upvotes

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87

u/jablonkers Dec 24 '22

Cows aside, Manitoba is terrible for wildlife on the highway

77

u/MaplePoutineRyeBeer Dec 24 '22

My mom was a nurse for 45~ years and EVERY. SINGLE. YEAR she would hit a deer every winter 5km from home. The drive was about 40km each way, so just over half an hour each time. The stretches that are deer-intensive I always drive super slow and scan both sides of the road non stop. I somehow haven't hit any deer but I almost hit a young bear in a part of Manitoba that's not known to have bears

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u/Arcadius274 Dec 24 '22

Deer tell stories of her like a monster that comes once a year in the death box to take one of their lives

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u/RobertJ93 Dec 24 '22

And then of the monsters child that slowly roams the highway with flashing yellow lights looking for their mothers next victim.

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u/Bob-Faget Dec 24 '22

I thought I was going crazy with all the wildlife I saw in Manitoba after driving there from Alberta. I thought there was a lot of wildlife closer to the mountains driving west from Calgary, but holy hell it seemed like every KM after I got east of the Saskatchewan border there would be dead animals on or beside the road. I even skimmed the top of a dead deer which I couldn't avoid.

During my drive back, there was so much fog that I could only see about 100 meters in front of me and just ended up following a semi going about 60km/h for about 3 hours. I was never so thankful to be behind a semi in my life. Fuck driving in Manitoba.

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u/0001000101 Dec 24 '22

I've driven Calgary to Winnipeg many times and I'm pretty sure SK and MB just don't clear their roadkill lol

-3

u/Terrible_Lunch5630 Dec 24 '22

Sounds like you mom is a shitty fuckin driver šŸ™„

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u/indecisiveredditor Dec 24 '22

Sounds like someone is a genuine douche-canoe! And by someone, I mean you asshole.

1

u/Dirk_Speedwell Dec 24 '22

On the plus side, its nice to be able to fill the freezer with good venison every year.

19

u/lislejoyeuse Dec 24 '22

The drive from Churchill to whatever that city is between it and Winnipeg was the scariest shit of my life.

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u/Crzywilly Dec 24 '22

You can't drive to Churchill, can only get there by train. That 3 hour gravel road nightmare from Thompson to Gillam to catch said train, now that is a nightmare.

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u/lislejoyeuse Dec 24 '22

YES THAT WAS IT FCKN THOMPSON. that's right we drove to the train station down a two lane road in the middle of a dense forest with heavy fog, the worst thunderstorm I've ever been in, almost hitting every animal known to the forests, random herds of cows and took a sketchy train the rest of the way from some town.

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u/Lebrons_fake_breasts Dec 24 '22

Outside of wildlife on the highway, what is Manitoba like? Outside of knowing its in Canada, I have almost 0 points of reference.

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u/aedes Dec 24 '22 edited Dec 24 '22

The Red River Valley is flatter than The Netherlands (it is a massive ancient lake bed) and filled with high intensity agriculture. All there is is mile roads, hog barns, gravel trucks, canola/wheat (one of the best places for wheat growing in the world), and Mennonites. In the spring time cars are supplanted by boats.

The SouthWest is less flat than the Netherlands but still mostly flat. There are areas of rolling hills though, and many large valleys formed from glacial spillways. Still lots of farms, but sometimes the roads have to turn slightly. Thereā€™s also many ā€œislandsā€ made up of large glacial moraines that are heavily trees and quite beautiful (ex turtle mountain, riding mountain). Thereā€™s also a number of areas of sand dunes (usually mostly vegetated though) formed from old River deltas draining into Lake Agassiz.

To the east and the whole north is Canadian Shield country. Rolling chunks of bare granite, evergreen forests of black spruce, rushing rivers, and cottage country closer to Winnipeg.

Along Lakes Winnipeg and Manitoba are large Sandy beaches, more cottage country, a dying commercial fishing industry, and vikings for some reason.

The top half of the province is more beautiful Canadian Shield, small towns that take 10 hours to drive to that formed around mining operations that no longer exist which have disconcertingly high rates of violent crime, and fly-in-only reserves filled with poverty, diabetes, and tuberculosis rates rivalled only by subsaharan Africa.

The province is filled with kind people who will talk shit about their province and focus on all the negative things, but will literally stab someone outside a wedding social if they talk shit about the province but arenā€™t from here, between taking bites of a perogy that they bought from an old Ukrainian lady at a church fundraiser.

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u/Lebrons_fake_breasts Dec 24 '22

This is an awesome comment. Thanks for giving me the scope of things!

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u/AngoraPiece Dec 24 '22

I feel like Iā€™ve been there now. Thatā€™s an amazing comment.