It has been a blast. Plenty of ups and a few downs. All in all, Manitoba is a great province to live in. Yet, as newcomers, we wanted to see more, feel more and do more. After twelve years of living in Winnipeg, the time has come to see different horizons.

As constant readers on this blog will know, my origins are from The Netherlands, with (ayy matey!) pirate origins in the far past, somewhere.

Let’s be honest. All pictures are memories, whether we like it or not. Some of them are nice, warm and fuzzy, others are shivering memories. Either because we were scared, moved or because we were just cold.

Most of the pictures in this post were from such a day. I think the temperatures were not that low, something like –12C or so. Yet a strong wind was blowing icicles onto my bones. This lead picture was from a very cold morning in Southwest Manitoba.

A few days ago, friends and I decided to go hunting for ghosts. Since there is a small park called Woods of the Spirits in Winnipeg, that would have been the most logical place to find any ghosts, right? So, off we went, while many were invited, only three people showed up. Physical distancing was easier this way.

I don’t care much for the term “social distancing” as that rhymes with social isolation to me, one of the causes for mental disorders. If people can get together in a safe way, then half of the isolation problems are gone already, just by showing up.

There is no doubt about it. The virus has us all in its grip. There is not a day without “news” about an outbreak, a restriction or even a cure for it. There is no way to know what to believe and what to discard. As a result, we all go half nuts for one side or the other of the spectrum.

I’m not taking sides or trying to haul people over to the “other” side here. One thing we can all agree on is that we all wish this would be over, and soon. Yet the frenzy doesn’t seem to want to leave us, so we need a retreat from it.