Remington Carriage Museum

Last Sunday we went out for breakfast, as Craig felt like pancakes and maple syrup. I now know why Canada is so famous for their maple syrup, it is delicious.
We then decided to drive to Cardston about 45mins South of Lethbridge to visit the Remington Carriage Museum.

The museum houses over 250 carriages, buggies, wagons and sleighs.
Each exhibit tells a story of late 19th and early 20th century North American society and the horse-drawn vehicles that were used. Interpretive scenes help put the carriages into context.


The photo on the right is of a stage coach at the back and a school van. The wheels of the van are easily replaced with runners for the snow.

The canvas curtains provided protection from weather, while charcoal foot warmers and blankets kept the children warm.




The museum displays include street scenes, a carriage factory, fire house, livery stable, wagon displays and a tack room.

Craig and I both tried out this cutter, it was a lot harder to get in and out of than I thought it would be. I don't know how women managed it in the 19th century in their long dresses.




The suspension feels very bouncy and it rocks from side to side when you climb in.

Every afternoon between the hours of four and five, New York's fashionable society 'took the air' in Central Park. They would drive around and around in their carriages, hopefully gaining social recognition.

Buffalo Bills Stagecoach.

The inside of a wagon. I can't imagine travelling very far in one of these.

Ric's Grill

Ric's Grill is housed in the old water tower. It is now a fabulous restaurant with great views of the city.

The restaurant boasts of providing a superior dining experience by expertly serving the highest quality foods. And they did!

The photo above is taken from the bottom of the tower looking up.

This view from our table is South Lethbridge. The College is in the distance to the right.

Brooks Aquaduct

On the way home we passed through the town of Brooks and visited the aquaduct. It is the largest aquaduct in the world. Originally built in 1915 by the Canadian Pacific Railway to bring water to the parched Alberta prairies. It is 3.2kms long and 20 metres high and at one time had as many as 600 men working on it. There were many accidents during the building process which took 2 years. Even when it was completed there were many problems, mostly design faults. The joints leaked and it began to rust!

In 1979 Government decided to replace it with a canal and fence it for public safety at a fraction of the cost for demolition. It remains as a monument to those who built it.

On the road to Hanna

On the Sunday we said goodbye to Drumheller and prepared for the trip home. Even though it was 76 kms further North, we made a detour to visit the town of Hanna. The photo on the left was taken out of the front window on the way to Hanna, you can see how flat it is.

The community was named in honor of one of the country's most eminent industrialists, David Blythe Hanna who was president of Canadian National Railways at the time.




Hanna is most famous for being the hometown of the multi-platinum rock band, Nickelback.

In the spring and fall, hundreds of thousands of Canada Grey Geese, land and feed in the Hanna Area. I don't know much about hunting but apparently you can take up to 28 geese and 8 ducks per day here which seems a lot of plucking to me. They also advertise over 100 different birds can be found in the area. I guess they have separate areas for the birdwatchers.

The town's main sources of revenue are agriculture, oil production, tourism, coal mining and retirement.

Hanna's Loonie Store
No this is not where they send the loonies or crazy Hannas. It is actually Hanna's $1 shop. A loonie, is the slang term for the Canadian dollar.

Our impression of Hanna was a very unassuming town, with a strong civic and family focus.

Heartwood Inn & Spa

This is where we stayed in Drumheller. The Heartwood Inn. We decided to pick an Inn for the advertised 'individual attention' provided.'
It has 8 different rooms with ensuits, a cottage and a chancel ( a fully equipped house with kitchen). We stayed in the lower turret, or the dungeon as the owner referred to it. The french toast in the morning was superb and more than one and a half inches thick!



At night the whole place is lit with fairy lights.




I took this photo opposite the Inn to show you the surrounding area.

Rosebud Theatre

When you travel - you observe and experience some truly memorable people, places, opportunities and events. There are some that stand out, as once in a lifetime occasions that you never forget. Rosebud theatre was one of those experiences.

Saturday night we drove to Rosebud for the dinner theatre. We drove past Horseshoe Canyon, which Indian's once believed to be haunted. The canyon which gets it's name from it's horseshoe shape, is approximately 3 kilometres long and has some spectacular scenery. It seemed as if we were driving for miles. Rosebud is actually only 30 mins South of Drumheller. Craig thought I had read the map wrong (as if), when it seemed like we were heading into the middle of nowhere. Rosebud has a population of only 100 people and is situated in a river valley in the Canadian Badlands.

It is now the largest professional rural theatre in Canada and most of Rosebud's residents are either involved with the theatre or the school of the arts. There are also gift and craft shops, a cafe, a gallery and a museum (housed in the old Chinese laundry), all of which are open on theatre days.
Main street of Rosebud, the Mercantile is on the left.

The history behind the theatre school and Rosebud Theatre is interesting - it started in 1973 as the Rosebud Camp of the Arts, a summer outreach program for Calgary youth. The summer programs soon expanded into weekend vacations throughout the school year. 1977, the Rosebud Fine Arts High School was formed. The school combined academics, arts and work experience . In 1983 to raise funds, drama students from the Fine Arts High School staged a comedy show along with a country style buffet with a little music on the side. 1986, Rosebud School of the Arts launched its post-secondary apprenticeship programme. In 2001, the new eight-month Certificate Programme started with 10 students. Rosebud theatre is made up of a company of resident artists employed by the theatre, guest artists for specific productions and students from the Rosebud School of the Arts. Rosebud Theatre now entertains more than 30,000 people per year.


The buffet meal is held in the newly renovated Mercantile (was the general store) Dinning Room.

Inside the Mercantile, the upstairs has been preserved as a general store, there are several rooms out back used for dinning, and downstairs is a gift and crafts shop.

Just as well we had limited time to look around as we could have spent lots of $$$ there.
We were called for dinner and appropriately escorted by our host into the library.







The buffet was delicious and we were serenaded by musicians as we ate our meal. The musicians asked where in Alberta people had travelled from, we became instant celebrities when we said 'NZ'.
Everyone was so friendly, they shared NZ travel stories and asked questions.

After dinner everyone wandered around the shops and museum and then made their way to the opera House for the play, 'On Golden Pond'. It is years since I saw the movie. We both thoroughly enjoyed it.

The Opera House
Even though Craig is not a ''theatre person"
he so enjoyed the whole experience
he is already planning another trip to Rosebud.

Drumheller Valley - Royal Tyrrell Museum

This museum is one of the largest palaeontological museums in the world. Found in the heart of the valley along the North Dinosaur trail. It lays out the story of the earth and the age of the dinosaurs. It is so huge it can take hours to get round it. Watching the archaeologists working behind glass walls in their labs was fascinating, they use tools that look like dentists cleaning tools. It is very precise work, we could see 5 different stations all with recovered fossils being prepared for display. There are some great interactive programs here for kids and in the summer there are fossil hikes and camps. The camps offer hands on learning opportunities in biology, palaeontology and geology PLUS sleeping in a real tepee. Or you may choose to 'snore with a dinosaur' by spending the night sleeping under your favourite dinosaur with family and friends.

We also saw a live tarantula - they are huge. No I didn't take a photo of it!

Craig looks as if he is about to walk through a star gate. This is the entrance to the various ages.

We found the Burgess Shale display the most intriguing and beautiful. The Burgess Shale is a layer of rock found high in the Canadian Rockies. It was once a watery home to over 140 species of soft-bodied organisms but is now a mountain ridge 2300 metres above sea level. The creatures at 12 times their actual size, are displayed in floor to ceiling glass cases and a glass floor that you walk over. The glass is so clear you feel you are not walking on anything.

There are over 40 complete dinosaur skeletons mounted on display

Tyrannosaurus Rex

Craigosaurus

Before we left Craig decided to try out the scales.

He weighs about the same as a large wolf.

You can't see my results as I didn't try it.

We found NZ ferns in the Cretaceous Garden - one of the largest living collections of prehistoric plants in Canada. It is a representation of plant life in the Drumheller Valley during the Late Cretaceous Period (70-65 million years ago) and a comparison of plants from today.

The Star Mine Suspension Bridge - Rosedale and the Hoodoos

Along the Hoodoo trail and only a few minutes from Drumheller is Rosedale.
Before the suspension bridge was built in 1931, men and coal would cross the Red Deer River in rowboats. The Alberta Government rebuilt the bridge in 1958 and opened it to the public to commemorate part of the colourful mining history of this area.

The wind was so cold and bitter that when you stood in the middle of the bridge it blew you against the railings and netting on the side of the bridge and tore at the skin on your face. The mine workings on the other side were covered in a landslide so there wasn't much left to see.

What is a hoodoo? The Hoodoos are fascinating 5-7 metre tall columns of sandstone topped with mushroom like caps. They are sculptured when rock is eroded by frost and wind directed rain. They took millions of years to form and can erode rapidly if their capstones are dislodged. There is a path that you can climb and walk around between them.

Drumheller

The drive was pleasant, the roads here are so wide and flat and very quiet even over the long week-end. We travelled for part of the time on the trans Canada highway which is dual carriageway and very fast. Driving along the highway the miles of prairies suddenly give way to steep, dry coulees ridged with the strata of hundreds of years of erosion. Drumheller is located in a valley in the heart of the Canadian Badlands, so called because they were difficult lands for explorers to cross. The valley at this time of year looked more like a canyon and definitely a place dinosaurs existed.

When we arrived the first thing we did was check out 'the World's Largest Dinosaur'
In this photo you can see how tall he is, our car looks like a matchbox toy beside him. That is the Tourist Information Centre on the left.

We climbed up inside him and looked out of his mouth. It was freezing up there. His jaw also moved heaps in the wind as he is flexible. I didn't get it in the photo but next door was an aquatic centre with an outdoor pool that had completely frozen over.

Vulcan

Vulcan is within an hours drive from Lethbridge. The town of Vulcan is renowed for its homage to Star Treck and Mr. Spock's home planet. This photo is of the Vulcan Tourism and Trek Station. It was closed over the Easter break so we will need to visit another time to have our photo taken on the bridge. Inside we could see Star Trek uniforms and life size cardboard cutouts of the crew among other memorabillia.

Road Trip to Drumheller

We left early Friday morning so we had plenty of time for stops along the way. We travelled west to Monarch and then up to Vulcan.

More Snow

Did I say it was getting warmer? This week we had more snow and overnight it got below minus 9 degrees. We planned to go away over Easter week-end and make the most of Friday being a holiday. Everyone here goes back to work on Monday. This would be our first road trip. We decided to go to Drumheller, almost three hours drive from Lethbridge. We packed the car and headed out, it had stopped snowing but was still cold enough for the snow on the ground not to melt.

Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump

Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump is one of the oldest, largest and best preserved communal bison (or buffalo)hunting sites in North America. Groups of native hunters killed bison by driving them through drive lanes and over the cliff. There have been metres of bones, tools and weapons recovered from the site. There is evidence of human acitivity in this region as far back as 11,000 years and this custom practiced for almost 6,000. According to the brochures the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) has designated it as a World Heritage Site. Which means it is placed in the company of Stonehenge, the Egyptian Pyramids and the Taj Mahal.

Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump gets its unusual name from a story about a young brave who wanted to watch the hunt from a unique viewpoint. He stood underneath the cliff and watched the buffalo cascading past him like a waterfall. Unfortunately for him it was a good hunt and the buffalo bodies piled up trapping him.When his people found him his head had been smashed in by the weight.

These photos were taken alongside one of the many displays.

The interpretive centre has received an award for architecture. From the road it is almost hidden from view because it is built into the side of the cliff.