Article in Sentinel Courier by Katie McInnes

Thank-you Katie McInnes for covering our story in the Sentinel Courier!  The Sentinel Courier serves the communities of Pilot Mound, Glenora, Chrystal City, Clearwater, Mariapolis, Mather and LaRievere in Manitoba - some of these communities were near or along the route Farmhands on Bikes took. In this way, Katie's article is one more way for the FOB team to connect with rural communities by sharing our story and experiences. Also of note, Katie and The Sentinel Courier have generously offered to send each FOB participant a copy of the newspaper containing the article about our trip.  We are grateful for this generosity and for many of us, seeing our story in a newspaper has been exciting and empowering.
In addition to containing beautiful photos taken by Katie, the article includes quotes from FOB participants and shares the perspectives of some of the farmers we visited. If you would like to see it, consider ordering a copy (or PDF) of this article from the Sentinel Courier by following this link: Sentinel Courier

Project Report

We created a project report for one of our sponsors and would like to share it with everyone!  Click on each image below to see the full screen version.

Thank you to the Harvest Moon Society!

After some time of rest and processing our trip, we want to share a bit about our experience with you folks who supported this initiative, who thought of us, encouraged us, lent us your gear and donated to make this dream happen. We also want to thank all of our donors and sponsors. This particular thank you goes out to the Harvest Moon Society.

The Farmhands on Bikes (FOB) tour was a whirlwind of an adventure which started on Friday morning with a bunch of people, many of whom had never met before, piling into vehicles and driving out to Clearwater, Manitoba. We didn’t quite know the extent of what the weekend would hold for us and there were mutual feelings of excitement and nerves as we drove out of the city together.

Loading up the cars on Friday morning

We began in Clearwater at the the Harvest Moon Learning Centre. In the beginning stages of planning the FOB tour, the Harvest Moon Society connected us with farmers who were interested in hosting us. The Harvest Moon Society had a large part in making this tour come to life.  

Leanna in the beautiful kitchen of the Harvest Moon Learning Centre

The Harvest Moon Society is an inspiring organization that works at building healthy communities and strengthening the connections between urban and rural communities. They have a beautiful facility in Clearwater where we were generously hosted by their program coordinator, Lacey Lord. Check out Harvest Moon Society’s website to learn about what sorts of work they are involved in and consider supporting them! (http://harvestmoonsociety.org/)

We started our trip off by having a community potluck at the Harvest Moon Society Learning Centre. A number of community members from Clearwater came down to the Centre to eat supper with us and meet our group. It was great to meet folks from Clearwater, to learn about their lives and to share with them some things about ourselves. The food that we shared was delicious and featured lamb kabobs and chicken wings that one of the youth, Khalil, had brought to share. Khalil brought a bbq and meat and he and Ali made an incredible feast for us.

Ali and Khalil barbecued delicious chicken and lamb

One of the hopes of FOB was to work towards bridging the rural-urban divide that we see in our communities in Manitoba. By inviting youth who live in Winnipeg to cycle down country roads, meet farmers and rural folks, we hoped that connections would be built between people groups who otherwise would not connect. We are thankful that Harvest Moon Society enabled connections while providing us with a wonderful starting point for our adventure.

Sitting around the fire at the Harvest Moon Learning Centre

We are so thankful for the ways that the Harvest Moon Society supported, funded and participated in this initiative and for the work that they do to build healthy and resilient communities. The Farmhands on Bikes tour would not be possible without them!

We Did It!

We did it! This past weekend, we had an incredible time on our Farmhands on Bikes tour. We had 7 youth join us on our four day trip which took us down country roads, to Harvest Moon Society, Fresh Roots Farm and The Dogs Run Farm. There are many stories to tell from our trip and we plan on sharing some of those soon. In the meantime, as we rest up from a full weekend, I (Erin) am overwhelmed with gratitude for all of the people who participated in this project, for the Harvest Moon Society who hosted us, connected us with farmers, and gave us a very generous donations, for the people of Clearwater who came out to a potluck and shared food with us, for the farmers whose generosity and hospitality went above and beyond what we could have expected, for the youth who courageously came with us on this tour and shared their stories with each other and those that we met, and for all of you who supported this adventure. It was a rich experience and we hope that we will be able to do something similar in the future!

(Thanks to Katie for the great photo of the Farmhands on Bikes crew with Katie and Colin McInnes at The Dogs Run farm)

Gearing Up To Go

As we have reached the last couple of days before our ride, we are nailing down last-minute details, gathering gear together, preparing food and getting excited for this adventure. Leanna has been confirming details with our hosts, Harvest Moon Society, Fresh Roots Farm and Dogs Run Farm. Nyree has been fixing up the bikes as well ascoordinating with our youth participants. I (Erin) spent the weekend making t-shirts for the ride and gathering gear together.

We wanted to have a unifying t-shirt that we could wear on the ride. As a fun, bright, and affordable option for t-shirts, I decided to tie-dye white t-shirts and use an iron-on printed transfer for our logo. A friend of ours created the logo for this trip. Many thanks to Tana for her creative work!

We were really excited about tie-dye

In the midst of the heat that we experienced on Saturday, I spent time outside tie-dying shirts with the help of friends (Thanks to everyone who has been pitching in to make this trip happen). The shirts turned out to be a range of colours, which make me happy and which will keep us bright on the roads.

Thanks to Tana for this awesome logo!

These next couple days, leading up to the trip are crucial for making sure everything is in place. As I write this, I have some zucchini loaves in the oven. If you ask me, sufficient snacks are definitely one of the most important details that needs to be covered before we leave! We will be leaving from Fortwhyte on Friday morning and driving to the Harvest Moon Learning Centre in Clearwater MB where we will have a community potluck and stay for our first night.

We are excited, anticipating fun and challenge, new friends, and learning. And we are continually thankful for to all of those who are supporting this adventure financially, through kind words and encouragement, and through welcoming us into their places as we cycle this coming weekend.