The Editor:
For most of the past 40 years, we have taken Highway 18 west to Rockglen and Killdeer on our way to visit my wife’s family in Great Falls, Montana. We visit friends along the way.
Two years ago, she remarked how beautiful this drive is and how much we enjoy it, but the highway has become bad now. It’s been reduced to rough gravel in some places and in others, it gives new meaning to the great Saskatchewan sport called “pothole dodge.’ As Judy was driving, I complimented her on her ability to miss most of the potholes. At one time the road was narrow, two-lane blacktop which was OK, because after Torquay, the traffic count slowly diminishes, but the road still has a lot of use.
The Big Muddy is one of the more scenic parts of the drive and over the years we’ve noticed a lot of changes such as the telephone lines that are now gone from the top of the fence posts and you can’t just drive over to the cairn where the North West Mounted Police post once sat. The cairn is still there, just fenced off. It seems that someone doesn’t want people to check out the historic points that make the province so interesting and that is surely one of them.
We haven’t stopped at Aust’s General Store in Big Beaver in years and that’s an interesting stop. Their motto was/is “If we haven’t got it, you don’t need it.” The last time we stopped, there was a wooden boardwalk in front of the store.
Around the junction of Highways 6 and 18, No. 18 starts to improve a little. Just north of Killdeer there was a crew working on repairing some of the rough spots, but no work is being done from Estevan to that point. It’s a shame that Highway 18 isn’t repaired so it could be the joy to drive on that it once was. The people who live along it would be a lot happier as they go about their daily business.
By the way, when we came back, we got on Highway 348 to Highway 5 at Opheim Montana, and drove across to Portal. The road there is really good. Someone in the United States must have spent some of that oil money on the people’s highways.
Reginald Jahn
Roche Percee, Sask.
