The morning began early; we had a long drive ahead of us. It would be 4 hours plus to reach a little place called Sceptre, Saskatchewan - the gateway to the Great Sandhills. We had a pleasant and uneventful drive, arriving in Sceptre right around 12:30 p.m.
Our stop in Sceptre was at the Great Sandhills Museum where we planned to get a map and eat our packed picnic lunch before heading to our destination.
We were impressed by what we could see just inside the museum and paid our admissions to do a quick tour. The museum was very well done, spectacularly well thought out and organized, and truly a pleasure to look through. We walked back in time on boardwalks in front of the train station mural and set, and explored everything from a classroom to a hospital room to a barn with horse stalls - all inside the museum. Really, it is a must-see and well worth your time to go.
After our museum visit we wolfed down our sandwiches in my car instead of the lovely picnic area because it had gotten cool and very windy (read: not nice). And then, map in hand, we headed off to find the sand dunes.
The map was accurate in mileage, although not to scale. We managed though and found it very encouraging to see a sign saying "Sand Dunes" and pointing that-a-way at our last grid road turn. Soon the gravel roads turned to sand and we knew we were close.
Ta-da! We've made it! Now to climb that first hill and start exploring...
We got to the top, stuck our toes in the sand and were hooked! We had to see and experience more and a short hike rewarded us with this fun and this view.
After some fun poses and picture-taking, I pointed out to my sister that there were other people 'way over there' exploring even more and bigger dunes. "We have to go over there," I said. "We've driven so far to see this!" My sister wasn't so sure, so I pointed to a midpoint and said, "Let's go to that spot, see how long it takes us, and decide from there." That worked and off we went.
Once at that point we realized it really hadn't taken us all that long, so we decided to press on, follow the sandy trail and reach our goal - those big dunes in the distance!
It was worth it! We ooh-ed and aah-ed and climbed and climbed and climbed those dunes!
All we needed was a beach umbrella and the sound of lapping waves and we would have thought we were at the beach with all that sand. Alternatively, we also only needed a camel and could have been on the set of Lawrence of Arabia!
A certain someone (my sister) really enjoyed herself and might have thought she was on a beach vacation for a short time. She didn't want to leave...
The views were fabulous and although it was windy and cool (and rain was approaching), we were thankful for the cloud cover while on the dunes. And we did come away with slight tans... See, we must have been at a beach!
We are so glad that we went, explored, and enjoyed the Great Sandhills. We had a wonderful time!
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