Yet another post about abandoned buildings and such

Yesterday, I again went looking for abandoned buildings and ghost towns (well, some were actually just on their way to becoming ghost towns). This is a surprisingly addictive activity. It was very sunny but rather windy. Perhaps I should have waited and went today instead?

Once leaving the main highway, it definitely didn’t take all that long to find some abandoned buildings. One of the places had some (very large) animal bones scattered around the back which was a different discovery. I also encountered some rather nerve-wracking construction. The road was very uneven dirt for at least a couple of kilometres; I don’t think it would have been possible to drive on it had it been raining recently. Afterwards, I thought I should have taken a picture but I certainly wasn’t going to go back! There were some abandoned buildings on this stretch but I just wanted to get the driving over with!

Some of the animal bones.

Orolow was the first ghost town. It had a couple of churches: Polish and Ukrainian Catholic. They both had cemeteries and were located a fair distance apart; maybe the communities were rather separate? The Polish one had a few graves (of the same family) that had both new and old headstones for the same people which is something I’ve never before. Both churches are definitely still being taken care of (some not abandoned) but they don’t have signs about service times etc. so I’m thinking that they aren’t actually used all that much. The Ukrainian one had an absolutely enormous quantity of birds in a nearby field and a snake right near the church itself. The most interesting thing about Orolow, and perhaps, of the whole day was finding a garage with an old car inside very well-hidden in trees. It had to be approached through the back but had clearly once faced a street. There were a couple other more easily accessible buildings behind it.

The car in an Orolow garage.

On the way to Krydor, there was a really interesting house behind a bunch of wheat. It was a bit far to walk to the house itself so I didn’t but I did get relatively close.

The house behind the wheat.

Krydor is a place that seems like it’s on its way to becoming a ghost town. It has people still leaving there but all the businesses look to be abandoned as well as some of the houses. Many of these buildings have signs about no trespassing and that they have video surveillance which is kind of strange. The other strange thing is that their yield and stop signs are really short; I am almost as tall as them! They do have a new miniature grain elevator for their 100th anniversary though.

One of Krydor’s vacant buildings.

Next we attempted to find a place called Oscar Lake which may still have an old schoolhouse standing. Getting there involved driving on a road that I’m not was actually a road but seemed more like a long driveway through a farm and while we did find the actual lake we didn’t find the town though I wouldn’t say that we made a real attempt either. The lake was very nice and the area seemed like it was not visited much at all. The road there seemed little-used as well. It that even if you don’t find what you’re looking for you’re bound to find something interesting while driving on obscure roads!

Oscar Lake.

After that, the roads looked more used though they were by no means busy! There were more abandoned to see; some we stopped at and some we didn’t. There was also a llama relatively close to the road. I’d never seen a llama in Saskatchewan before! It moved as soon as I went to take its picture though.

Keatley was the next intended destination. There was a bridge there but the tracks had been removed. There was also a grain elevator and perhaps some more buildings in the middle of the farm. I think if I’d turned down a road closer to the bridge instead of following the GPS to nothing, I may have found more but I could always go back there if I want!

Lastly, I headed to Speers. Speers is definitely a weird place. They still have a library and a post office and very popular looking bar but they also have a number of abandoned buildings and some people living in buildings that look like they should be abandoned.

Speers’ abandoned legion.