Act Three

It has become a tradition for some members of the F family to camp together.  This year we were at Otter Falls in the Whiteshell.  It was nice, there has been talk of returning next year.  The weather was definitely not too hot, but at least it only rained Thursday evening.

Friday we went to see the Petroforms; rocks arranged like turtles, snakes etc that are spiritually significant to the First Nations People. 

 The wild blueberries were plentiful and so delicious.  Everyone helped themselves to an early lunch appetizer.  The afternoon was spent relaxing while L&K played on the playstructure.

L&D arrived Friday night.  Saturday we hiked Pine Point Rapids Trail.  It was a little more ambitious at 8.2km return, but with some brainstorming Grandma was convinced that she could make it to the first waterfall.  She did!

Grandma rested in her lawn chair with a book and a view of waterfalls while the rest of us did the second loop.  With 4 kids and 6 adults it was bound to happen that someone would get separated from the pack.  C turned off the trail where Uncle L was exploring, Ly missed this and continued on, moving faster and faster to try to catch up.  When we realized that he was missing Daddy hurried up the trail, they were gone too long for my liking, but eventually Ly backtracked and was found.  Thankfully he stayed on the trail and wasn’t really lost.

Sunday morning we organized ourselves for a game of ultimate Frisbee, boys against girls.  It was fun, even if the girls didn’t stand a chance.  I vote for a rematch on Mom and Dad’s lawn.  After running around in the sunshine we braved the lake water.  It was still too cold, but with true Manitoba spirit “it was refreshing”.

Thank you all for a great time, as Ly moaned during the packing up “360 days is too many days to wait!”

The next stop was Lake Louise.  Aunt I, though an Alberta resident for many years now, had never been to Lake Louise in the summertime.  It is tourist madness, which is always rather unpleasant, but there is a good reason why it has become such a magnet: it is really, really beautiful.  L and K tested the water with their bare feet.  There’s nothing quite like standing in liquid ice.

We said goodbye to the mountains and headed to Calgary for the night.  Although we all had a wonderful time, we were also tired of being campers and tourists.  We went out for supper and enjoyed a warm house for the night.

Early the next morning we left for Winnipeg.  We hadn’t decided whether we were going to do the whole trip in a day or stop for night somewhere along the way, but things were still going very well when we got to Regina, so we decided to press on.  The next two hours were eventful for all the wrong reasons.  K is still working on mastering the whole potty thing.  I guess the pizza we picked up in Regina got things moving and we had to make 4 emergency roadside stops in the first 150 kilometres out of Regina.  Several of them were false alarms, but, unfortunately, several of them were not.  Good thing we could transport soiled underwear in the trailer instead of in the back of the car.

Anyway, we pulled into Winnipeg early in the morning none the worse for the experience.  Now if only we had more camping planned for the summer.  Oh wait, that’s what we were doing the last few days in between posts.  Stay tuned.

Aunt I made sure that the kids knew just how cold the water melting off the glacier was.  K, again not as impressed with our surroundings as we were, decided that she would have more fun if she pretended to be Princess Leah.  Don’t ask us how she even knows about the Star Wars character.  Neither of our kids have seen the movies, and we don’t really talk about them.

After having a bite to eat, we decided to tackle the Parker Ridge hike.  When Pam and I did the hike on our honeymoon, there was a lot of cloud cover and fog, which turned to snow halfway up the mountain.  The weather looked gloomy this morning as well, but by the time we finished our lunch, the sun was shining happily.  We were very impressed with our kids.  K made it about a mile up the mountain before I put her in the carrier, and L did the whole thing—up and down—with his own steam.  The view at the top was spectacular.  It gave us a nice bird’s eye view of the Saskatchewan Glacier and the small lake at its foot.

On the way down, we had to stop to set our feet in some snow.

After recuperating back at camp with a bit of supper, we decided to do a bit more exploring in the Kootenay Plains Ecological Reserve where our campground was situated.

It was a wonderful day.  Hopefully our children take a few memories with them.

L didn’t know what to do with himself while we were setting up camp, so Aunt I suggested he build something with some of the sticks that were lying on ground around the fire pit.  Of course the first thing that came to his mind was to build a little shelter for his prized souvenir from the Museum giftshop.

After supper, we went for a walk.  K was busy admiring and picking flowers.  I wonder where she got that from?

I am always amazed by the sheer size of these animals.

L was in his glory.  K, having spent the previous day trying to enjoy herself while everyone else was reading information plaques and listening to the guide go on about the “late cretaceous period,” was somewhat impatient with the whole process.  Eventually she figured out that she could draw some attention to herself if she became the palaeontologist or tour guide, so she started pulling people around and explaining the exhibits.  Both L and K got to take something home from the giftshop, though the decision proved to be a very difficult one for L.

After spending a few hours at the museum, we did the obligatory tourist thing and climbed the “world’s largest T-Rex” and took a family picture.  

Aunt I knew about a suspension bridge over the Red Deer River a few miles east of Drumheller.

We enjoyed the view for a few minutes and then made our way to Handhills High Country Hideaway for the night.  Here we are taking a look at the day’s photographs.  After supper, the kids and I tried to catch a fish at the campground’s private fishing pond.  The fish were jumping, but they didn’t want any part of our bait.

Day 3 started great; K woke up with “my first happy dream”, something about Dad blowing his nose.  The mosquitoes were still around so we had breakfast in the tent, packed up and headed off on a Fossil Safari.  Fossils were everywhere to be found, even for L.  L, K & I saw a rattlesnake on the road from the back of the bus, Daddy missed it and was disappointed.

K eventually rebelled against fossil hunting, so she and Daddy started their own cactus hunt.  She wanted to go back but there no mosquitoes where we were so the rest of us were happy to be looking at fossils.

We spent the afternoon exploring the Dinosaur Provincial Park Visitor Centre and hiking around some more.  By then we were tired of mosquitoes and just plain tired, so we headed on to Calgary arriving in time for a much needed shower and supper.  The evening was spent wrestling with Aunt I and Miss J on the floor, while Dad checked emails and uploaded work he had done on the drive.

We were excited about the camping spot we selected until we got out of the car to set up camp.  The mosquitoes hit us like we were the only food on the planet.  Even though the wind was blowing the hats off our heads, the mosquitoes still managed, somehow, to find the leeward side of our bodies and dig in.  It was bad.  We hurriedly put up the tent so L and K could play inside, away from the bugs.

We even elected to have all of our meals inside the tent.

Fortunately, the mosquitoes weren’t quite as bad out in the hills and on the trails.  We went to see some covered dig sites—the building in the first picture houses one of them—and after supper we went to climb some hills and view some of the hoodoos around the campground.

We made a pit stop in Brandon.  This picture was taken mostly to show off our newest purchase.  To this point, our camping gear has always accompanied us in a cargo basket on the roof of the car.  As the family has become larger, the amount of gear that needs to come along has increased and the space inside the car to haul it has decreased.  Although all the necessary gear still “fits” in the cargo basket, it is quite a chore packing and unpacking it all, because it always has to be carefully wrapped with a tarp to protect it.  After doing a lot of internet research and test driving, we finally opted for this 5×8 utility trailer.  The fancy lid was built by L & L Enterprises (in our backyard) in the days before we left.  For our next camping weekend, it will have the ability to haul bikes as well.  Although it was never tested by a heavy rainstorm while on the road, we did drive through some light rain and endured a thunderstorm while camping.  Our gear stayed dry through it all. 

We pitched camp at Besant Trans-Canada Campground near Moose Jaw.  The campground was a little run down and the tent sites were small, but we enjoyed our stay.

We went for a walk after supper.  K was excited to see some cacti growing in the wild.  We also found some saskatoons along the road.  The campground had a little pond that was called a swimming hole.  We hadn’t brought our trunks along, but we hiked up our shorts and got our feet wet.