Alberta Rocky Mountain Tour – Calgary

2020 AUGUST 29 —

Leaving the majestic Rocky Mountains is rather abrupt. One minute you are surrounded by huge mountains, then a few miles along you are on flat prairie – which has its own beauty. I love the mountains, but in my heart, I am a flat-lander.

We got to Calgary later in the afternoon. We checked into the ALT Hotel. I have never been in a hotel that was so digitally savvy. The room key activated the panel that controlled the heat, lights and window blinds. The bathroom had mood lighting. After dropping our bags we went for a walk along the Bow River. Calgary’s rivers don’t have the steep banks that Edmonton’s North Saskatchewan River has. It is easy to see how Calgary completely flooded in 2013. It was a pleasant walk and the weather was warm. We had dinner at the charbar restaurant. We had eaten there after Sara’s grad a couple of years ago.

The next day we went to the Calgary Heritage Park. It is one of Canada’s largest living history museums, covering 127 acres of land. It covers Alberta’s early settlement years ranging from the 1860’s to the 1930’s. Many of the buildings are historical and were brought to the park to create living streets, complete with houses, a working bakery, a hotel that serves meals, homes, carpentry shop, gift shops, post office, and a working amusement park to name a few of the 180 exhibits.

There is a working steam engine that offers rides around the perimeter of the park every 15 minutes.

The buildings are furnished with genuine artifacts to depict the life of that particular era.

The staff dress in historic costume and use antique vehicles or horse drawn buggies. We bought 4 loaves of bread, 6 cinnamon buns, and 4 cheese buns. 2 cinnamon buns got eaten while we watched part one of a four part enactment of a train/mail robbery. Then took a ride on the steam engine.

As we made our way to the older Fort-era part of the park, we stopped to look at old farming machinery. It is rather comical to see machinery that our father’s used on the farm now in a museum. In our minds they were not relics! It made me realize how quickly the years slip by and how my memories will be a historical event to my children and grandchildren. I took pictures of the farm implements that I remembered Dad using when I was a child.

There was a tipi encampment that was closed for a private event. All we saw was an original stone ring left from a long forgotten tipi and the smaller stone ring in the centre that held the fire pit.

We wandered through old houses set up in the style of their day. One house had a lady baking cinnamon buns in the old-fashioned way and in a wood stove oven.

We looped back to the area with the actors, steam engine and amusement park. Down a different, more modern street we had a quick look in the Prince House. It was built in 1894 by Peter Anthony Prince. He was a lumber and hydroelectricity magnate who, the story goes, obtained an exclusive contract to provide Calgary with electricity after he fell on an unlit sidewalk. It was a small mansion, even by today’s standards.

A bit further along was the Famous 5 Centre of Canadian Women. It is a replica of Nellie McClung’s home. She, along with Emily Murphy, Henrietta Muir, Louise McKinney and Irene Parlby petitioned the Canadian Supreme Court in 1928 to have women recognized as persons under the law. They lost. Persistently, they took their case to Britain’s Privy Council, Canada’s highest court at the time. On October 18, 1929 the Privy council declared women as persons.

Heading back toward the entrance gates we stopped in at Gasoline Alley, a huge building that houses seemingly hundreds of old cars, gas pumps, and other automotive memorabilia. Each car had a detailed description of the car and a little story of how that particular model played a role in automotive and Canadian history.

There were also placards that depicted what the average income was of a particular year, how much basic necessities cost, what the population was of Calgary, Alberta, and Canada, as well as Canadian and World headlines of the year. It was very entertaining and educational.

According to the website, they said to allow 2-3 hours to see everything. We had arrived at 10:00 am, it was now 5:00 pm. Considering many of the buildings were closed due to Covid, we felt we could have spent a lot more time exploring.

Thankfully, the on-site Selkirk restaurant was still open. We were getting tired and hungry, and rather than try to find a place near our hotel, we opted for dinner here. It was an excellent choice. The food was delicious and the service was fantastic.

The next day we went to the Calgary Zoo. Our favorite attraction is the hippos. Usually, we sit on the tiered benches and watch the massive beasts defying all reason as they swim gracefully along. Due to Covid, the benches were cordoned off. It was basically a walk by, “Oh, look at the hippo”, and keep moving. It was disappointing.

We carried on hoping to see the lions up close, but they were sleeping near the back edge of their enclosure. The lemurs were not romping outdoors.

We went through the Rain Forest building. The highlight there is the gorillas. But, again with Covid, they were encouraging the gorillas to go outside, so that people weren’t crowded together by the big glass windows. We went through the building quite quickly, but not so fast as to miss things, and went to the large outdoor area to see the wonderful beasts. One gorilla was using a stick to reach into a box to obtain food. They are such amazing and intelligent creatures. My dream is to see them in the wild.

Another favorite spot for me is the ENMAX Conservatory. They have an atrium full of plants and flowers. The jungle moist air is always so wonderful and I love flowers. I walked around the loop twice.

Directly across the lobby of the Conservatory is the butterfly pavilion. If I thought the atrium was warm and jungly, the butterfly pavilion is downright steamy! There are hundreds of butterflies of various types. The most favorite for everyone is the Blue Morpho butterfly. It is a big butterfly that seems to wobble when it flies. Blue is very rare in nature and as a result these beautiful insects are exploited by collectors. There is a glassed off area where you can see chrysalis hanging and some beginning to open.

After the Conservatory, we made our way to the black and white Pandas. The panda enclosure was closed – the pandas were going back to China. We were getting rather frustrated with so many of our favorite exhibitions closed or altered, that we decided it was time to head back home.

Our one week stay-cation came to an end. We really enjoyed it. We live in a very diverse province and have the attitude of “We can see that any time” but we never go. Covid forced us to vacation at home. We saw and experienced things we didn’t realize were so close to home. We have since talked about taking another road trip – in December.

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