October 2022 – OsteoPraxis on the road

Hopefully the last epic drive.

Finally…the 16th of September rolled around…..time to leave Under 8 Flags…….

…..and take possession of our new abode.

The house met, if not exceeded all expectations from its’ MLS listing and subsequent virtual tour…… The purchase was made, and the beginnings of a new home base was underway.

Epic drive no. 1 was the journey from the Bay of Fundy to Milk River to view the property. No. 2 was for the retrieval of all our worldly goods from storage in Brantford.

We had explored various options for moving the goods, and because all of them realistically involved us actually being there to either supervise the loading or do the loading ourselves….the most sensible option became renting a cargo trailer locally in Alberta, hauling it to Ontario…..filling it…and then hauling it home.

Our most excellent Realtor, Ken Just of Century 21 Realty in Taber AB generously offered the use of his ‘billboard’ trailer. We gratefully took him up on that offer.

Taber (corn capital of Canada…!!!) is just under an hour from our new home…..so the journey began with picking up the trailer in Taber.

Monday morning had not yet quite arrived when we set out on the first section of our drive, 12 hours approx to Jamestown ND. The downside of driving due east….is the first part of the morning is driving directly into the sunrise….beautiful….but not the greatest for visibility.

Crossing at Coutts just after 6am was uneventful. “What’s in the trailer?”….”Absolutely nothing”….”well ok then….have a nice day…!!”….is pretty much how it went..!! To describe the Coutts/Sweetgrass border crossing as low key would be an understatement…!!!!

The midwest,Montana, North Dakota is not particularly populated…and the long straight easterly road has one thinking often of self driving cars…..!!!! It gets pretty exciting to see a curve appear on the GPS several miles ahead…!!!

We hit Jamestown in the dark….and left again in the dark of the morning……so we can’t really offer a comment on the town…!!!

Next stop ….10 hours this time…..was to Rockford Illinois. In Rockford we had the inspiration that pizza was the ideal “road food’….easy to store, easy to eat in transit……and it was pretty good pizza too….!!!

We left Rockford and struck out for Paris. We had not calculated traversing Chicago in the morning rush hour…….a bit hairy….but we survived…!! Indiana and Michigan are pretty much those horrid ridged concrete highways and roadworks…upon roadworks…….argh…!!!

Crossing back into Ontario at the Ambassador Bridge…should be the last time we need this blooming blinking arrivcan app thing……

Arriving back with J+M…our most gracious and ever patient hosts is always a pleasure….and a fun time to catch up.

We just had to stop to pick up coffees at the new Detour coffee location at the Wincey Mills in Paris.

After a great feed and a good nights’ sleep…it was time to tackle the storage unit. At 10x 11 ft…..it demonstrated a mastery of Jenga, stuffing everything efficiently into the limited space available.

The next trick was a transferring it all to a storage unit on wheels, balanced, with an outside chance of most of it arriving still recognizable……and still being able to pull it……(especially over the mountains in Northern Ontario.)

After a bit of juggling…..most of it was in….!!!

Finally the unit was empty…….

The first part of the return journey (we had to go back through Canada owing to the quantity of alcoholic beverage stored in the black boxes..!!) , and the hardest part…or maybe just the scariest part….was crossing Toronto……mostly scary because we were uncertain as to how well (or badly) this thing was going to tow loaded…….

First stop was Goodmans Motel in Espanola……..not the worst place we have ever stayed…….right on the highway…..so handy for getting right back on the road.

So….without incident…and having worked out that 2 to 3 hours of driving is enough at a time…….switching out regularly made the long driving days much more do-able ( when we did the drive from Fundy we pretty much drove ’til too tired to go on…..then switched…….not the recommended method…!!)

Next stop Thunder Bay. That drive from Sault St Marie up the side of Lake Superior, and across the North shore is so spectacular….and terrifying taking those down grades with a loaded 20 foot cargo trailer…..!!! But all negotiated without incident…

The Super 8 in Thunder Bay was….OK…..the most fun here was the truck driver that blocked us in the parking lot when he came in at 3am…….took an hour to wake him up to get him moved so we could continue……not the most relaxing start to the morning…!!!

Brandon Manitoba….last motel stop before home…actually the best hotel stop on the trip so far…!!!

Then the final leg, headed home……….

Saskatchewan is not the most exciting province to drive across….!!!

Because Milk River is about south in Alberta as you can go…the route took us off the Trans Canada and through some great little towns like Seven Persons, and Manyberries…….(Editor, if I discovered a country and could name places…oh boy what fun)

Pulling in the driveway felt so much like coming home………We don’t remember ever feeling so very comfortable and at home so quickly in an entirely new location.

The next morning, the neighbors greeted us with a visit…!!!

Sept 14th. Writing-on-Stone Provincial Park.

We were very pleased to realise that Milk River is actually only about 90 minutes from Waterton Lakes…..makes it kind of our local park…!!!

The drive from Waterton to Milk River for our last couple of days before the house closed, is a straight drive east, just slightly north of the Alberta/Montana border. We stopped back at Under 8 flags campground again…..a very handy spot for the border….and our house..!!!

To avert some impatient thumb twiddling we took the drive to Writing-on-Stone Provincial Park.

This park is another gem in the Alberta Parks portfolio. I had tried to snag us a campsite there…but there was nothing available around the time we needed it. When we actually saw the campground…we were even more disappointed to not have found a spot there. It’s a really lovely campground, right down on the Milk River, surrounded by big old cottonwood trees…..

This park has a really fantastic visitor centre with lots of information on the history ,geology, flora and fauna of the park.

As you walk down from the visitor centre you enter this ‘alien ‘ landscape of hoodoos…….it’s amazing…hard to believe all a naturally occurring phenomenon.

The Hoodoo trail has been set up as an interpretive walk. ……and it’s been really well done. As you start the walk, there are little booklets that explain the various lookout points/points of interest along the trail.

Even though this is another badlands landscape, it is completely different again from all the other we have seen. (Dinosaur Park, Horseshoe Canyon Trail, Badlands National Park SD )

This park has quite the array of petroglyphs…

Weaving through the rocks, climbing the carved stairs, wowing at the views around every corner.

It’s not the longest hike we have done…but its richness is unparalleled.

The rock formations are incredibly beautiful….

…and the added glimpses of the river and the valley all add to the magical quality of the park….

There were many signs warning that we were visiting during snake migrating season. We had a few sightings…the first was at one of the lookouts, I turned a corner and found this chap sunning himself on a rock…!!

He was amazing…..from the ‘shushing sound he made as he wove across the rock…to his incredible camouflage once he was in the undergrowth. You could see him when he moved, but if he was still….even though you knew exactly where he was…it was like he just became invisible…..incredible. (no rattling…!!)

This area along the Milk River was a wintering spot for Prairie Peoples. Both because it is warmer by the river, and because there is an abundance of berries and wildlife.

Further along the trail there are more pictures. The big one at the end of the trail is an extremely cool battle scene…complete with the showers of bullets from the European invaders….

It’s a huge panel of carving with intricate detail of both sides of the battle….very cool.

On the path back, we met the next prairie rattlesnake…I almost stepped on this big sucker as he made his way across the trail…. scared the living……*&%^$ out of me……LOL…..

It’s such an incredible place…we are very fortunate to have this on our doorstep. ( 41 kms from our house..!!) We took note that they do night sky activities here…..we might have to check out some of their organised night sky observances thingummies….there is so little light pollution here that the night skies are quite something.

EXTRA PIX

Cameron Lake to Summit Lake

Well its been a busy few weeks now that we have become earthly bound again.

Moving in and preparing for winter has somewhat curtailed our adventuring for the moment….but luckily, I still have a few adventures to catch up on..

This is the third trail we completed in the oh so beautiful Waterton Lakes National Park. The trailhead is deep into the park, a long and beautiful drive through the skeletal forest of the burned parkland.

The trailhead is at a ranger station by Cameron Lake. It’s a spot where paddleboarding and kayaking seem to be the main activity.

…and the trail heads off upwards almost immediately. The path is bounded by the lush greenery of the opportunistic raspberries taking their chances with the access to sunlight in this part of the cycle of the forest..

As we came around the first corner there was a local standing right on the path in front of us. She stood and took a long look at us before she bounded off into the trees.

The climb up to Summit Lake is a series of long steep switchbacks.

…up, as usual, the upside of the up grade…is the view down…!!!

…and of course, appreciating the view is the greatest excuse to stop and catch a breath from time to time…!!!

Nearing the top we were starting to see more signs of bear activity. Scratched up trees…….scat on the trail…..

As the top neared, the landscape leveled out, and the raspberries gave way to tough grasses….

Summit Lake was a very small body of water….

….there were people there already with their picnic, so we walked a little further on to see if we could see in to the next valley

Its hard to believe that its been four years since this burn. The charring of the tree trunks looks so fresh. It also makes some quite spectacular patterns…!!

Time to head back down. It was starting to get a little cooler, fall is definitely in the air….

…another upside of the changed tree-less landscape….the visibility for marauding wildlife is that much clearer…….hopefully they see us coming as well as hear us (we are not quiet…!!)…ie we saw no bears…!! (phew..!!)

I keep saying it, but its true……the walk down gives you a prolonged look at the views….spectacular……

We even found an especially weird looking fungi……and tons of wild raspberries..

We started out fairly early to this one. Turned out to be a good plan…there were lots more people heading up the trail just as we neared the end…….we had it mostly to ourselves…….most of the way…

Another beautiful trail, another beautiful day.

Extra Pix

Sept 11th…..Big Bertha

Yes it actually is a legit trail on Alltrails. ( Upper Bertha Falls to Bertha lake Trail..!!) There was a promise of some views, and also some elevation…the two do so often tag team together…!!!

The trail starts in the village of Waterton, and as such it is a relatively busy trail. It gets less busy as you climb, a lot of the people out on this one stop at the waterfall and venture no further.

The trail weaves upward above the village, up high enough to see out over the lake afore you turn in to the wind and start to climb the next valley.

We had to stop just to take in the breath-taking view down the lake……

…and then the path starts to go up a little more seriously…….

The next bit of the trail is a steady up to the waterfall.

We opted not to stop and take pictures at the waterfall as there were many, many young people spread over the rocks paddling their feet in the water and munching sandwiches. (snapped a shot on the way by tho..!!) We don’t go in for such dillydallying, ( 😂 ) and carried on.

From here up the trail gets a bit more challenging…..!! I think I counted 20 switchbacks….and it’s a climb.

I trundled along at my, not very exciting but steady pace.

There was a young couple ahead of us and they kept stopping, but every time we started to catch up, they would race off again (we chuckled as they raced off each time…..they clearly did not want us oldies catching them….!!)

By the last few switchbacks…they had crashed, stopped, breathing heavily clutching their legs and gulping water heh heh…!! Us oldies are relentless..!!! The tortoise and the hare, slow and steady.

There was a very impressive waterfall close to the top….but there was no clear sightline for the camera to get a decent picture…

The last gasp to the top followed by a few switchbacks down to the lake.

……..and the occasional break in the trees to look down into the valley where we started….

It is quite magnificent…..and we were blessed with another beautiful sunny day. and the sunlight bouncing off the water added a bejewelled sparkle to the blue blue water.

Again, it was much busier than we were used to, but we found a quiet spot in one of the small bays around the lake to sit and have a snack and a water break….and soak in the surroundings….

The shrubbery around here is very dense…….perfect bear habitat…….this was one of those spots that there could have been bears sitting right next to us and we would never have known….the upside of that being….that if they WERE sitting next to us…they were not interested in messing with us…!!!Not today anyway…