Something that we haven’t been able to do all summer was walk along the river, here in Winnipeg. The water level was constantly too high to allow for anyone to walk near the river without getting his feet wet.
So here is the new take on it: wait until the river is frozen, then take the walk 
. Wanna see what it looks like? Come on in!
The Assiniboine river is a shallow river. It also has a lot of curves. No serious ship or boat will use it for navigation. That leaves the river for all the small pleasure boats.
Just attracting attention
This little boat here was photographed only seconds before it hit the bottom of the river… I don’t think they really appreciated that. But is shows how shallow the water is.
Now, the river is frozen, at least the biggest part of it. So walking from the Manitoba Legislature to The Forks is possible again on the Riverwalk.
Looking back, Legislature on the right
The first time I ever walked on this river was about three years ago. The weather was cold and windy. I didn’t have a hat or touque. After an hour walk I was simply frozen. Needless to say that since then I have acquired a touque and even a fur hat.
Warm and cozy is the keyword here.
Towards The Forks
The going here is easy, but you have to remember that you are walking on ice. The Assiniboine River has not decreased in the last few months, still having far too much water for the season. Specialists say that there will be huge flooding next spring.
Patch of sunset
When you see a patch of golden sunlight like this, there is always a chance that behind you, the picture is even nicer. So we turned around…
Sunset over the river
The black stripe you can see in the middle of the ice is still free flowing water. No skating there, yet. I have all faith in the weather gods to freeze even this last little part of the river so we can have a nice skating rink.
Strong lines
When you speak of river and water, you also speak of bridges. Photographically, that always means strong lines. As you can see, not everything is frozen here. The city of Winnipeg, however decided that this patch was thin ice.
Thin ice
The ice was indeed so thin that even a lonely duck was still using it for some exercise. Anyway, it was thin enough for me not to wander on *that* surface
Looking back, there was still the setting sun. The wind was starting to blow a bit too. Usually I don’t mind a little wind, but when the standard temperature is around –12C, a “little” wind can make the temperature feel like –23C very quickly.
The last part of the sunset
A digital camera has some difficulties absorbing the high levels of contrast and luminosity when taking pictures against the sun. The pictures shown here of the sunset over the river are HDR or High Dynamic Range pictures, stacking 3 pictures of different exposure together to get the best out of each single picture.
The result sometimes may seem a little flat, but a little tweaking in Lightroom can take care of that. I don’t consider that photo “manipulation” and it fits my type of photography.