I'm originally from Saskatchewan but I've been in Alberta almost my whole life. Most of my extended family is still in Saskatchewan, including my grandparents.
Life being what it is, sometimes things are shitty and we have to make the best of them, or at least do what we can to be comfortable. Right now that means moving back to Saskatchewan to help out.
We aren't going to talk about that though. Just a little context for you.
I came here alone and R is still back home, which obviously sucks. But to make it better we decided to spend the weekend together in North Battleford, Saskatchewan, halfway between the 2 of us.
The town has a lot to offer but almost everything that we wanted to see was still closed for winter.
We weren't about to spend 4 days sitting around because of it though!!
We love to get outside, especially with our cameras, and find little adventures.
I'm not really sure how the idea came about or who suggested it but we decided to drive down the dirt roads and explore old abandoned farms!! I also really wanted a picture of some grain silos.
They were all similar but had a touch of uniqueness as well.
Some buildings were clearly homes, others housed animals and a lot I imagined to be for storage.
The first place we went to had several buildings on it. A garage(?), several small outbuildings, and a house. I particularly liked the garage and the house.
The house on this property was the only one we saw that actually seemed like people had really lived in it. Though by the looks of it no one had been there since the 1970's.
We spent a while very carefully exploring some of the rooms in the house, and specifically avoiding others. Any room with obvious floor damage is off limits, if the ceiling is caved in it's a no-go and we never ever even attempt to try stairs.
All kinds of randomly assorted garbage, papers and household stuff was strewn everywhere. I looked (with my eyes only, no touching) for papers that had dates on them. We found something from 1978-1979, and now I have decided that's when the people ran away from home.
I like to make up little back stories in my head for why people would just up and leave their homes. The idea of doing that is really crazy and foreign to me.
We took the time to explore all the little outbuildings and walk around the property.
We didn't go inside the next place, just took a few pictures from the outside.
This tiny little house was one of my favorites to look at, it had nothing inside and it was all alone in a field but it just seemed so charming. Little house on the prairies!
We spotted this big house from the highway and just had to stop and check it out. It was the only 2 story house we saw and I couldn't resist it. It looks like it dropped right out of a horror movie!
Once we got up to it we could see that it must have been quite lovely in it's day, but it's not in such great shape now. We didn't go inside at all because the floors were all caving in, but it's still pretty cool to look at from the doorway and windows.
One wall was spray painted and would have me believe that that particular hole in the floor was the 'entrance to hell' ... Told you it was a horror movie!!
Every place we stopped at was a bit different than the last. Some have lots of buildings, others only have one. Sometimes we were able to go in, other times we couldn't even open the doors.
This piece of land had lots of buildings but they didn't offer much. Most of them would have fallen down if they weren't rigged to stay up. Heavy wire wrapped around the boards on opposite walls to keep the walls from slanting and eventually falling.
I should probably mention, as much as I like to snoop around and explore these places, one of my favorite parts is photographing the way the sun shines through the old wood. It's very appealing to me.
This little place had a sign - "Hunting with permission only"
I guess that's a good way to get some use out of these old places!
I have lovingly dubbed this place as "Tilt-a-whirl" because of the row of slanted shacks. Its actually quite disorienting to look at.
It was quite the journey getting out there. The field was completely flooded! But I am clever and keep rubber boots in my trunk!! Once we got there it didn't take long to realize we couldn't get into almost any building. The slanted ones were falling over and others had been boarded shut, from the inside..... how creepy is that!!??!?!
We had an awesome time exploring the dirt roads of Saskatchewan, it's something I will definitely do again!
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