The trip is about 480 km. Thus, it takes as long as fourteen hours. Hundreds of kilometers of nothing. The train often stops in the middle of nowhere and people appear or disappear from the bush like apparitions. In fact, the most striking thing about this part of Manitoba is its lack of people.
Life is rough and isolated here compared to the affluent south.
We met many people headed home to remote communities along the line after shopping in Thompson, and we got a good sense of how isolated and alienated they really are. In Gillam, the thing to do for teenagers on a Friday night is to come down and hang around the train station, and then run through the train when it stops. The people were open and friendly, and they exhibited frontier ruggedness. But many were poor, and there was evidence of alcohol abuse. We had our eyes opened to the realities of northern life.