Rain in am but bowled in Juan De Fuca, worked on Posters for summer events, social bowling and supper at the club, then home for a hot tub and a movie.

Chapter 5.

My first thought on entering the house on our return from Nelsonville was to get the stove set up and a good fire started.  This was soon accomplished and the furniture brought in and arranged in place, and we all felt quite elated with the improved appearance of the room.

The small camp stove we had was unable to prevent the earth floor from freezing, and now the new stove thawed it out, and when we sat on the chairs the legs would penetrate the ground but after a time when the floor became dry and packed this feature was overcome.

A clay floor or a poplar floor were the only floors at the time and sometimes were overlaid with a layer of hay.  This gave a warmer appearance to a room but sometimes this harboured fleas, which recalls to mind a letter I received from an old timer a few months ago, which said: “Do you remember the night you spent at our place, when we arose and slept in the haystack in order to escape the fleas?”

Although we felt elated with the improved appearance of our room, it was often remarked that the housing of the settlers during their first year was usually not equal nor as good as that which the animals occupied back on the old homestead.   However in a year or so all these temporary abodes gradually disappeared and were replaced by substantial and comfortable dwellings.

Those who have been reared with all the modern conveniences around them, never appreciate them as those who have endured the privations of the pioneer, and in the matter of food the pioneer is usually cured of his likes or dislikes for certain foods, and is satisfied with what ever is given him to eat during the remainder of his life.

Our usual diet was pork, beans, bannock, dried apples and syrup.  We had plenty of prairie chicken and rabbits.  Potato was the only vegetable, and they soon became frozen while on the way from Portage, and when thawed out and cooked were not very palatable.  While the cows gave milk it was a great aid to our diet.

We had a small organ, a violin and a banjo, and these instruments served to help pass away the long winter evenings.

“The Winnipeg Free Press” was the only newspaper we received and it came very irregularly as well as other mail, for Portage was our nearest post office.  When someone went there he would bring the mail for everybody and distribute it along the way.

During the winter we made frequent trips to Portage for supplies.  It was impossible for the few settlers west of Jim Warren’s to keep the trail in good condition for the tracks became drifted over soon after a sleigh had passed, so our cargo each time was limited to what could be hauled under such conditions.  We usually planned to reach Warren’s the first night from home for he had good accommodation for man and beast.

The trail led from house to house in as direct a line as possible.

Mr. Sanderson’s house was the first on the trail, then Jackson’s and Edward’s, where Mr. Duncan of Glenboro spent his first winter; then Sam Ballard’s dugout on the side of the ravine, then Henselwood’s, Palmer’s and Warren’s.  From here it led by Stedman’s to Ring’s, and on through the willow swamp to Mr. Delf’s stopping place which was about two miles from the river crossing.  This was a popular stopping place to be reached in coming from Portage.