Westward Bound

The Legislative Building, in Regina

We visited many friends and family in Regina.  I thought I would show you a little of the area around the Parlement Building.  Wascana Park and area is quite lovely. The trees in this part of Saskatchewan are all planted,the area is grassland, so only a few shrubs are found naturally, so the park is quite spectacular from that perspective.  They have a lake, man made, and many trees flower gardens.  Walkways around the park and around the lake. 

Queen Elizabeth, on her favorite horse, that happened to be from East End, Sask.

I found this guy in the Museum of Natural History in Regina.  I still have not seen a live Moose!  Some day.

We then left Regina, and drove to Maple Creek to visit, and then to Medicine Hat. The drive to Medicine Hat on the 29th was not comfortable, as the wind was gusting and very strong.  We were glad it was only 80 kms.  We then stayed at my cousins place for a couple of days, as the next day proved to have even higher winds, gusts of 115 km/hr.  We said nuts to that!  My cousins have a large, level, lot, with power, and lots of sheltering trees, so it was a great place to camp to wait out the wind.  Thanks, Lloyd and Sandy.

This is my little cousin Walker, helping me blow out my Birthday Candles.  He had to practice, because his birthday is coming as well!  And I was glad of the help.  Ha ha. 

Today we started out fairly early and there was no wind!  Yeah!  I have included some pictures of the prairie for those of you who have not traveled across the great plains.  It is sometimes completely flat, sometimes rolling.  If you keep your eyes open, you see antelope, hawks, deer, coyotes etc., as we did.  You can see forever!  I was born in this kind of area, so I find it quite interesting and even beautiful, in its own way. 

The above pictures are two reasons why Alberta is a 'have province', oil and beef cattle.

The foothills just outside Calgary

And the Rockies!  It was cloudy, but we got to see the tops of the mountains on the way by.  That is unusual for me.  It usually is very low clouds when I go through the Rockies.  I was very pleased to see the tops!  We did get the odd snow flurry, so we are glad we are nearly home.

It's not easy building roads here!

These two pictures were taken by our campsite in Golden, B. C.  The train is just across the Kicking Horse River, right behind our campsite.  So I am sure we will hear them in the night.  But otherwise it is a beautiful spot. 

 

So today was a day of contrasts.  From the Flatlands, to the foothills, to the Rockie Mountains. 

We have one more day on this wonderful journey.  Some of Canada's most beautiful vistas await us as we climb Rogers Pass with its glaciers and descend into the Shuswap Lakes and on to to the Okanagan.