In addition to world renowned sites like some of the ones in Jasper and Banff National Parks, Canada is home to many hidden gems usually known only to local people. We also found some of those on our recent travels.
After saying good-bye to our son and his family and leaving the mountain parks behind, we spent another week in the nearby foothills where we camped at Bottrel, Alberta with our daughter’s family. There’s actually nothing at Bottrel except a general store and a small unserviced campground, but we heard about it because our son-in-law’s mother lives nearby.
The campground is only 40 minutes from our daughter’s home in northeast Calgary. As soon as we’d set up camp on the bank of the lovely little creek that runs through the campground, we drove into the city to pick up Drew, our oldest grandson, who enjoyed two days of camping with Gram and Grandpa before the rest of the family was able to join us.
One of the things that we wanted to do during that time was introduce Drew to kayaking, but the creek was too small for that and we didn’t know of any lakes in the area. Richard spoke to the storekeeper, who also runs the campground, and learned of a small fishing lake nearby that’s known only to the locals. The highlight of our outing to Winchell Lake was the rare opportunity to watch a loon and her chick close up!
About 20 minutes from the campground, on our way into Calgary, we had also passed signs for Big Hill Springs Provincial Park. A quick online search revealed that its 2.3 km (1.4 miles) hiking trail with an elevation gain of only 20 metres (66 feet) was popular with young families. Not intending to do the hike until the rest of the family joined us, we decided to take a drive over to the park just to check it out. Drew was so enthusiastic, however, that we ended up hiking the entire trail that day! Of course, as little boys are inclined to do, he put in a few more steps than we did!
Later in the week, we packed a picnic lunch and returned with the rest of the family. With Drew as our guide, we did the hike again.
An interesting geological feature in this small park, which is located in a beautiful coulee, are the mounds of unusual rock called tufa (too-fah). Apparently tufa forms when water, rich in calcium and carbonate, emerges from the ground. As it comes to the surface, it releases carbon dioxide into the air and forms outcroppings of calcium carbonate rock.
The first part of the hike was particularly pretty following a stream with lots of little waterfalls.
I believe this was 3-year-old Simon’s first hike, but he was very keen to go!
Later in the afternoon, back at the campground, the creek was a great place to cool off!
Fashion Friday is back! You may recall that we started our six weeks of travel by heading north to Dawson City, Yukon to attend our nephew’s wedding. In my grandmother’s day, it would have been considered scandalous for a woman to have shown up at a wedding with bare legs, but this is 2017 and the wedding was outdoors on a very hot, sunny day. Bare legs would have been perfectly acceptable, but on an older woman they can look terrible. Could I really thumb my nose at the current “no nylon” trend?
Following Augustine 