Manitoba Road Trip: Windmills and Prairie Hills

We explored some more of our province this weekend thanks to Travel Manitoba! They put together over 12 comprehensive Road Trip guides to help make your next road trip a breeze. There are so many fun stops I didn't even know we had in our province! You can find the full list of road trips here. I can't wait to explore more places this summer. We decided to do the Windmills and Prairie Hills road trip and visit Portage La Prairie, Holland and Treherne. Jason actually used to play Junior Hockey in Portage, so it was so nice for him to be back. We visited his Billet family, the rink he played at (which now has his Buffalo Sabres jersey hanging) and went for lunch with one of his teammates who still lives there! It was honestly such a great weekend for our family.

Hotel

We stayed at the CanadInns in Portage La Prairie, and it was great! The inside lobby is huge and feels kind of like a rustic chalet. We got a suite with a kind bed and a pull out couch, which was perfect for our family. The girls favourite part was the pool area. It had a nice sized pool, big waterslide, hot tub and a kids pool area. The girls went on the slide about 50 times, it was so much fun! They also have a restaurant in the hotel, Aaltos, which we had breakfast at the first morning. The menu was really big and the food was good. There is also the Tavern United in the hotel that's open for dinners, but we didn't have a chance to try that one out.

Restaurants

We tried a bunch of great restaurants over the weekend! On the first night we tried Bill's Sticky Fingers, which has been around for years so we knew it would be good. The ribs were amazing! They fell off the bone, I definitely recommend stopping in if you're in the area. We also went to Booster Juice for a lunch, Mr. Mikes for a dinner, What the Scoop for ice cream and Chicken Chef for breakfast the next day. Then we grabbed lunch In Treherne on our way home from Holland at the L&J Drive in. The food was so great and it was right off the highway! We ate at some of their picnic tables and then got icecream for the road.

Splash Island

The highlight of the weekend I would say was Splash Island. We got the perfect weather and the girls had so much fun, and so did Jason and I! My sister and her kids met us from Brandon and we spent over 2 hours swimming. They have two big waterslides, one small wide waterslide, a kiddie area with a slide, sprinklers and lots of swimming areas. You can bring your own food in, or they have a canteen you can purchase from. It was the best time!

Fort La Reine Museum

This was an unexpected surprise. To be honest, it sounded kind of boring and I thought the girls wouldn't have fun. Everly left asking to go back every day and said it was her favorite museum! The other two loved it as well. It's an old little town basically with houses, doctors office, churches, a school, military store, etc and you get to go through them all and explore. The best part was they had a Monarch scavenger hunt hidden around the houses so the girls were always looking for something in each house. It kept it fun for them!

Holland Mini Golf

We left Portage on Sunday after breakfast and wanted to head up to Holland. It's a small town less than an hour away. When you drive up there's a huge Holland sign, a big windmill and a mini golf course! We did a round of mini golf with the girls. Everly and Rosie loved it, but it wasn't Zara's thing. She just wandered around.

After Holland we drove through Treherne for lunch, which I mentioned above, and then made the drive back to Winnipeg. Overall it was such a fun weekend! I love that it's under 2 hours from Winnipeg and a quick family road trip to do on free weekend. If you didn't want to spend the night, you could also make it a day trip and just visit the Museum and Splash Island. It would be such a fun day for your kids!

I'll share a little cost breakdown for those who are wanting to plan this trip for themselves:

Hotel: $175/night

Food: ~$400 (you could make this less, or bring some food with you too and not eat out every meal)

Splash Island: $36 for a family pass (5 people)

Museum: $10/adult, $5/kid, 4 and under is free

Mini Golf: $16

Gas: ~75 (this will obviously depend on your vehicle)

TOTAL: ~$900

Let me know if you take a MB Road trip this summer!

Best,

Stacey