High on the plains

Win­ter has a qual­i­ty that beck­ons pho­tog­ra­phers out­side. Along with the low sun and snow and ice, it feels like a brave act to pack your kit and head out into con­di­tions that would find many rest­ing a new log on the fire and prepar­ing a hot drink. 

Hav­ing vis­it­ed Cana­da in the win­ter before, I was fur­nished with the knowl­edge that cold in this coun­try cer­tain­ly does mean cold, some­thing which I have expe­ri­enced in the rel­a­tive shel­ter amidst the Cana­di­an Rock­ies. In Jan­u­ary 2026, I con­tin­ued an explo­ration of land­scapes that had tak­en me across the Great Plains of Mon­tana and North Dako­ta in the USA, but this time would be my first oppor­tu­ni­ty to pass over the north­ern bor­der into Saskatchewan.

As human nature com­mands, I spent much of the week before my arrival brows­ing the weath­er fore­cast to gain an under­stand­ing of what it had in store for my arrival. What became appar­ent was that the con­di­tions were going to be much cold­er than expect­ed due to the onset of a polar vor­tex, which is a vast pool of air that stub­born­ly spins high above the North Pole. This occur­rence would almost cer­tain­ly guar­an­tee high winds and tem­per­a­tures close to minus forty degrees centigrade.

Thank­ful­ly, there was lit­tle snow, and with a 4×4 vehi­cle, the roads were eas­i­ly nav­i­ga­ble. We left Saska­toon behind and head­ed up into the wilder­ness. It’s chal­leng­ing to describe mak­ing pho­tographs in tem­per­a­tures such as this. The expe­ri­ence lies some­where between exhil­a­rat­ing and uncom­fort­able. It quick­ly became appar­ent that loca­tion stops would be short. This was not by choice, but by quick­ly real­is­ing that the cold was ever-present. Eye would read­i­ly stream if fac­ing the winds head-on, and the pur­suit and abil­i­ty to car­ry on would reach a terminus. 

This image is from one of those stops. Not a sched­uled loca­tion, but one that could not be dri­ven through with­out the oppor­tu­ni­ty to get out. The winds were pass­ing over the flat open plains at about fifty miles per hour as the thin clouds above scud­ded by, occa­sion­al­ly break­ing up, allow­ing a milky sun­light to briefly grace the land­scape. Dry ice crys­tals would dash across the high­way, often oblit­er­at­ing the road and view ahead. It is not a pho­to­graph if the aban­doned set­tle­ments I had come to vis­it, con­tin­u­ing my stud­ies on the USA plains, but a pho­to­graph of what I was enveloped by.