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Japan may have cherry blossoms in April but Saskatoon has hoar frost in February. (And no, this does not make us a city of hoars.) Over the past couple of days the trees have looked flash frozen, as if they were zapped by a witch with designer tastes and a minimalist aesthetic. It almost makes up for visiting the prairies in winter.
A cold spell …
It’s all done to dress up the city for Valentine’s Day, of course, as even Mother Nature wants to celebrate the news that’s been garnering big headlines this week: this small prairie city on the banks of the South Saskatchewan River is the most romantic city in Canada, according to online retailer Amazon.ca. Their reasoning? Saskatoon buys the most romance novels, sex and relationships books and Michael Buble CD’s of any city in Canada.
Winter whites
Since I went to high school here, before moving to Ontario, the UK, Spain, Korea then back to Toronto, I would have to counter that it was, however, a hard place to get a date in high school. But maybe that was just me. Or maybe Joni Mitchell, too. She went to high school here – was she a social success? I’ve noticed she writes a lot more about Paris.
Cold enough for a ferret?
Saskatoon’s title as the Romance Capital of Canada isn’t the only love/sex/procreation news in Saskatchewan. The black-footed ferret, once thought to be extinct, will once again – if all goes to plan – be producing offspring in southern Saskatchewan. About half of the reintroduced newcomers come from the captive breeding facility at the Toronto Zoo. As if just being born isn’t enough, however, successful applicants had to attend wilderness bootcamp in Colorado for 3 months. (And no, I am not making that up – they were soft city critters, I tell you! Soft!) Come spring, they should be breeding and frisking about in Grasslands National Park, and living up to Saskatchewans’s romantic reputation in general. Hopefully, they can handle hoar frost and Michael Buble, though there is no predicting a ferret. They may just prefer cherry blossoms and Joni Mitchell CD’s.
Read more: There are plenty of other activities to experience in Canada. Get a start with my Things to do in Canada travel post.
Cathy Fowler says
March 9, 2010 at 3:19 pmHi Carol, I did not know that Saskatoon folk read a lot of romances.
You are probably going to get more people moving to Saskatoon than the economic boom the province has had.