The Swans Don't Care That You Drove Out
Saskatoon Island is not an island. It hasn't been for a long time. The water dropped, the land joined up, and the name stayed put out of what I can only assume is regional stubbornness. I respect that. Half the places in the Peace are named after something that used to be true.
The park sits a short drive west of the city, north of Highway 43 and just shy of Wembley. It is the kind of trip you can make after supper in June and still be home before the light gives out, which in June is a low bar. Saskatoon Lake is on one side, Little Lake on the other, and the reason most of us bother is on the second one.
Trumpeter swans. Big ones. The largest waterfowl on the continent, and they look it, especially when one lifts off the water and you hear the wings before you register the size. Grande Prairie calls itself the Swan City, puts swans on signs and in logos and on the occasional municipal recycling bin, and then mostly forgets that the actual birds are twenty minutes away, doing their own thing, unaware of the branding.
That last part matters. The swans are not an attraction. They are nesting. Little Lake sits inside a federal migratory bird sanctuary, and the viewing area is set back for good reason. Bring binoculars. Without them you are looking at white smudges on a pond and telling yourself it was worth it. With them you get the black bill, the long neck folded like a question mark, and, if your timing is right, a pair moving through the reeds with grey cygnets trailing behind like badly packed luggage.
Timing is the whole game. The swans come back in spring once there's open water, settle in, and get down to the slow business of raising young. Early summer is when the cygnets show up. By fall they're flying, and then they're gone, and Little Lake goes back to being a fairly ordinary lake with some ducks on it. Go in May and you'll see pairs. Go in July and you'll see families. Go in November and you'll see your breath.
The other half of the name grows along the trails. Saskatoon bushes, thick enough that people were coming here for the berries long before anyone drew a park boundary. Late July is when they turn. The trails themselves are short and flat and pleasant, the sort of walking you can do in running shoes while carrying a coffee, and they will not change your life. They don't need to.
A few honest notes. The mosquitoes in early summer are not a rumour. Wind off the lake can make a warm afternoon feel like a different month, so bring a layer you think you won't need. The campground fills on summer weekends with people from town who wanted to go camping and also didn't want to drive very far, a philosophy I fully support.
And September is the sleeper. The bugs are mostly done, the poplars are going yellow, the cygnets are nearly the size of their parents but still that dull grey, as though they haven't finished loading. Fewer people. Better light. The swans are getting restless, practising takeoffs, running across the water with that slapping sound that carries further than you'd expect.
Stand there long enough and a pair will go up together, low over the reeds, calling to each other in that flat brass note the species is named for. It sounds less like a bird than a car horn somebody is pressing gently, twice, to let you know they're leaving.