Once again Manitoba and its capital city Winnipeg have made a top 10 travel list, likely coming as a big surprise to most Canadian’s outside the central province. But there’s good reason both Winnipeg and Manitoba should make the list.
Late last year, Lonely Planet was the latest travel news outlet to include Manitoba as a must-visit location. Previously the province was featured as a destination by National Geographic magazine, and many news outlets have highlighted the city. We couldn’t agree more.
Manitoba easily makes top travel lists for its unique and stunning nature, and for the opportunities for tourists to encounter majestic wildlife. Winnipeg is often just the jumping off point as travellers head North to Churchill to encounter the polar bears and the Northern Lights. Yet the city is worth an extended visit as it holds much charm. There are plenty of reasons to visit Canada, and too many cities to experience in the vast nation, so it’s easy to overlook this hidden gem.
The prairie city sits at the geographic centre of North America, surrounded by a province twice the size of Germany yet with a population just over one million. Tourism Manitoba frames the province as the heart of Canada and North America due to its location.
While indigenous peoples had lived in the region for centuries, white settlers soon converted the Hudson’s Bay Company trading post into a permanent settlement. The declining fur trade helped the Company sell of their tenuous land rights, while an emerging new Canadian “dominion” began to see the prairies through their own British North American manifesto destiny. Three years after the first four eastern and maritime provinces formed a nation, a small section of Manitoba was brought into Confederation along with the whole Northwest Territory, as the fifth province.
Once considered a few times after European settlement as the Chicago of the North, Winnipeg was at one point the third largest city in the Canada before being passed by other cities grow post-war, including the nation’s capital and Vancouver. Eventually two cross-country railways would converge on Winnipeg, allowing the city to become an important transportation hub through which manufactured goods from Eastern Canada flowed West while raw materials and grain flowed East. The city has experienced a series of booms and busts, numerous city wide floods, and economic setbacks that have kept the capital’s growth slow, and as a result, measured. It remains the only major Canadian city with a population under one million, and a provincial legislature built for a population twice the current size.
Winnipeg Guide
There are plenty of reasons to visit Winnipeg, and wider Manitoba. While the city might not garner the recognition with its own Ville Route City Guide, the guide below will easily substitute. Likely because of its remote location, Winnipeg created an arts and culture scene early on, institutions that remain today. The city is renowned for the Winnipeg Art Gallery, Royal Winnipeg Ballet, Royal Manitoba Theatre, and Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra. With two well-regarded universities, Winnipeg has become an important centre for the prairies, providing a home to the first medical school in Western Canada.
Enjoy the weather
At times the city is nicknamed Winterpeg, and for good reason, but that shouldn’t stop a visit during the core winter months (December to February). Winnipeggers will proudly boost (as if to remind themselves) that the city gets more days of sunshine than LA, thanks in part to the sunny but frigid winters. Locals embrace the cold, dress for it accordingly, and get outside when they can. There’s even a festival to embrace it, the annual Festival du Voyageur. Summer brings high temperatures with much less of the humidity Eastern Canada suffered with. June, July and August are pleasant months, and the city plays host to a season of festivals (jazz, fringe, folk, comedy and the uniquely Manitoban Folklorama).
Transit & getting around
Winnipeg is home to New Flyer, one of the largest transit bus makers in North America serving the fleets of NYC, San Francisco, LA, Vancouver and of course its home city. That said, transit in Winnipeg is less convenient for reaching many out of the way tourist destinations. Most buses do leave from Downtown out to the urban neighbourhoods and suburbs. The city may be spread out, but getting around by car (or Uber/taxi) is quick enough. A lot of parking is free throughout the city, all meant to encourage the dependancy on cars.
The Forks
We start where it began. Now a historic site, the Forks has been a meeting place for hundreds of years, both for the indigenous people of the area, European fur traders, and modern locals. The section of land marks the point where the Assiniboine River flows into the Red River. With settlement the Forks became a railway yard for the Canadian National Railway which built its nearby Union Station and train shed fronting Main Street. There are a handful of ways to enter the Forks, one being through the grand and underused train station.
Today, the Forks is a meeting place for the community and visitors, and worth stopping by. Several former railway buildings have been restored and converted creating two market buildings, a children’s museum (complete with a historic train engine), and a former power station now turned tv studio. The Forks also feature new buildings, and plans for the Railside walking-friendly neighbourhood in the future.
In Winter, an ice rink and skating path are opened at the Forks, and one access point for the Red River skate path can be found at the Forks pier. Summer sees numerous events with boat tours leaving from the pier, and a stage hosting community events including Pride in early June.
At the North edge of the park sits the Canadian Museum for Human Rights, a must visit building both for its stunning architecture and thought-provoking installations.
Canadian Museum for Human Rights
Located next to the Forks stands the Canadian Museum for Human Rights, an important institution and one of the few federal museums not located around the national capital. The building is stunning, with the exhibitions laid out in a series of rooms the spiral upward.
Exchange District & Downtown
On the edge of the small downtown financial district sits an amazing 20-block neighbourhood that would be the jealousy of many city. Thanks to one of the city’s booms, many buildings were built at the same time, and the following boom left them preserved long enough to become treasured. The Exchange is home to some of the best restaurants, bars and cafes in the city, and an ideal neighbourhood to explore on foot. We recommend Clementine Cafe for breakfast or brunch, Deer + Almond for dinner, Parlour for a quick, peaceful (no working or wifi) coffee, and Darling Bar for an epic cocktail.
Manitoba Museum
The provincial museum has a great series of exhibits covering the natural history of the region as well as the early settlement of Winnipeg which was recently refreshed. One marvel in the collection is a replica ship, the Nonsuch, which was built and sailed from the UK following the path of early fur trade routes (without the portaging by canoes)—by today’s standards it’s a small ship but would have been a typical ocean going vessel centuries ago.
Learn more about the Manitoba Museum
Royal Manitoba Theatre
One well-known cultural gem is the famed Royal Manitoba Theatre which stages multiple productions every year, and has in the past hosted the Canadian premiere of many plays and musicals before transferring East to Toronto. The Centre saw the Canadian premiere of Come From Away, the world premiere of The Boys in the Photograph (by Andrew Lloyd Webber & Ben Elton), and a staging of Hamlet starring Canadian actor Keau Reeves.
Checkout what’s at the Royal Manitoba
Winnipeg Art Gallery
The WAG-Qaumajuq has become both an important cultural institution and icon in Winnipeg. It is home over over 24,000 works from various artists, and recently built a dedicated extension for its collection of Inuit art, the largest in the world.
Riel House
Just as the Dominion of Canada was about to take possession of the otherwise occupied lands the Hudson’s Bay Company had a monopoly over, one Metis resident and lawyer took acceptation to the handover some of the current residents hadn’t had a say over. Louis Riel stood up to the federal government and led a rebellion that faced off an army, and in doing so helped make the formation of Manitoba unique among the provinces. While the Metis were fighting for their own way of life against the Eastern Canadian approach to land settlement (laying a perfect grid over imperfect land without thought for farms having river access), the movement wasn’t including the indigenous people also being displaced. Riel is considered the father of Manitoba, and his mother’s house remains a museum to Metis life on the prairie.
Learn more about the Riel house
Assiniboine Park Zoo
Winnipeggers will point out that Winnie the Pooh was named after the city (and it’s true, in a way), and as a result you will find the Winnie the bear statue inside the Assiniboine Park Zoo. More importantly the Zoo is the best place to witness a polar bear without travelling all the way to Churchill. There are also local grassland and boreal forest animals including the mighty bison, cougars, wolves and reindeer.
Royal Aviation Museum of Western Canada
The newest attraction to be added to Winnipeg, the museum’s brand new home is located conveniently at the airport, and features one of the best collections of bush planes in the world. A must see for any aviation fan.
Learn more about the Royal Aviation Museum
Fort Garry
There were two Fort Garry’s, Upper and Lower, both former fur trading posts. Upper Fort Garry is located in downtown Winnipeg across Main Street from the Forks, and while it is a National Historic site in Canada, there’s little remaining of the original fort. A stone gate tower is all that remains, located next a small heritage park with an interpretive installation.
Lower Fort Garry is a full remaining Hudson’s Bay Company trading post. With the original (now Upper) Fort Garry destroyed in the 1826 flood, Company governor George Simpson had a new fort built on higher ground and down river. North of Winnipeg on the banks of the Red River, the fort was a key location for the Company, and witnessed at least one key moment in Canadian history when Treaty No. 1 was signed. However Company headquarters never completely left the Forks and embraced the Lower fort.