Even though we left our mini Perth vacation only 2 months ago we were thrilled that we would be seeing family so soon. My parents were doing a little round the world tour and had built in 10 days to visit us. We had done a lot of British Columbia through living in Vancouver and our road trip through the Rockies earlier this year but since we moved to Calgary in July we had not explored much of Alberta (except Jasper and Lake Louise on our May road trip). Having my parents come to visit us left us the opportunity to explore a large amount of Alberta with people we love.
So in the middle of summer on the wettest and smokiest day we had experienced my parents arrived in Calgary. Having flown literally around the world to get to us Brendan and I volunteered to drive us the 3 hours from Calgary to the Timeshare in Lethbridge. Most of our friends in Calgary told us that there was no reason to visit Lethbridge and there was nothing to do there but since that's what everyone says about Perth where we live in Australia and we love it we ignored them. I'm so glad we did.
We drove through a huge storm and arrived in the rain at our resort. The guy at the desk gave us exceptional service and we were upgraded for our accommodation because the resort had noted how far we had travelled to get there (well how far mum and dad had travelled). This put a huge smile on my parents faces as we headed off to bed.
The next day we decided to explore the local area and went to a place in town called Fort Whoop Up. This was an unexpectedly good experience, not very expensive and the museum was comprehensive. What made it that much more spectacular was that they had rebuilt part of the fort and set it up how it would have been back in the late 1800's early 1900s and it included a horse and cart ride. The fort was set up as a trading post for the illegal whiskey trade. We then ventured into town to explore and as not much was open we treated mum and dad to their first experience of Poutine. They loved it!
On this trip we learnt a lot about the first nation people of Canada and one of the places we learnt a lot from was the world heritage park at Heads Smashed in Buffalo Jump. This site is one of the many places that the first nation people used ingenious methods to coerce the buffalos to stampede and rush over the cliff to their death. While it sounds morbid it actually meant that the buffalo herd were only targeted once in a blue moon and left the first nation people with everything to make food, clothes, shelter and even toys for their children. It was a vey sustainable way to live. Visiting the museum was great (its 7 stories tall!)as it was full of so many interactive exhibits. We spent about 2 hours there but you could definitely spend a whole day there. While we were at the top of the jump we ran into some other Aussies and one of them was wearing a Freo Dockers top which made us feel like we had just been Perthed. Seriously we went to this attraction on a weekday in the middle of fall and its in the middle of nowhere. Not exactly where you expect o see a fellow Aussie.
Alberta is also known for part of its province being covered in what they call the "bad lands". This moonscape area is also one of the largest places that people have discovered dinosaur bones and there are many museums dedicated to this phenomenon. We found a town which was south of Lethbridge which had a little dinosaur museum and instead of heading to Drumheller which was 3 hours north of Lethbridge we decided to go to this tiny place instead. They had a few exhibits and a few bones which were cool but it was also mixed with some colonial memorabilia so it was a bit of a weird set up. It was cheap and we enjoyed the hour or so we spent there but were most grateful for the tour guide who suggested to visit the town bakery for lunch. This was the highlight of the day. The bakery was so tiny it only fit 8 people sitting down but the food was delicious. They had soup, chilli, pastries and fresh bread. Brendan and I had pizza pastries for lunch and mum and dad had the chilli and bread. For desert Brendan and dad had sticky cinnamon buns and I had a saskatoon berry pastry and it was AMAZING!
The last major tourist attraction that we ventured out to see was the wonderful Waterton National Park. This national park is on the southern boarder of Alberta and the park crosses into the USA. There were major bush fires burning in the USA side of the park in the days leading up to our visit and we were a bit nervous that it would be closed or we would get trapped in a bush fire area. With my dad having made it his lifes work to track out of control bush fires in Australia we had the worst case in mind. We were pleasantly surprised when we did arrive at the park as the bush fire had been contained and it was no longer a threat. There was however huge fire scars in the park from another massive fire 12 months earlier. This side of the park was closed so they could rehabilitate the natural plants and wildlife. There was still plenty of the park to explore. We decided to go into the little town and do a walk along the shore of the lake which town was situated on. The walk was beautiful all be it a bit windy. The view of the lake between the mountain, in my opinion, rivals that of the Lake lousie view. It was out of this world. After we had our walk, Brendan and I convinced my parents to try a beaver tail ( a sickly sweet Canadian treat). They loved them. Then we decided to walk to the Prince Hotel and found what we thought was a track up the side of the hill to get there. Turns out it was more like a rough gap in vegetation and likely not a real path as it was so steep we almost fell off the hill! The view at the top and the beautiful Prince Hotel made the almost 100% vertical climb worth it. To cool off after our crazy climb we again ventured into town and found a cute little cafe and ordered some drinks. It was a lovely way to end our trip to Waterton National Park and we 100% recommend you visit if you are ever in Alberta.
That finished off all our planed trips from Lethbridge and we thoroughly enjoyed the whole week staying in luxuary and often finishing each evening with a soak in the spa which overlooked the canyons and golf course.
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