12th July 2008

12 July 2008
Today we set off to the Calgary Stampede, some two hours drive from Banff.
We thought that the traffic might be bad as they get so many visitors to the stampede and decided to make an early start.
We left the hostel around 8am before most of the other residents had woken. The traffic was not as bad as we expected and so we arrived much earlier than we had planned. We missed the direction signs for the stampede car parks and ended up at an ice cream and milk shake parlour for our breakfast. It turned out that the owner of the shop had been a steer wrestler, but had broken his neck doing this so had retired to run his shop. He also told us we could park outside his shop in a closed road and walk from there into the stampede.
The Calgary Stampede is huge!! There are all sorts of farm animal competitions and craft halls as well as an enormous and very noisy fun fair. A lot of people seemed to have bought or won the most amazing selecction of very large stuffed toys from horses to bears to fish and frogs! There was every kind of stall just like Blackpool but bigger.
We went into the stampede grounds early and whilst it was quiet had a good look round the animal stalls, where the owners were preparing them for different competitions by shampooing and hosing them and trimming their coats..
After an early lunch in the huge dinning area, outside there were stalls selling every kind of junk food imaginable including Pizza on a stick and elephant ears which are like beaver tails only savoury! After lunch we went to the main arena to watch the rodeo events.
The bareback riders had to try and stop on the top of their bucking horses for 8 seconds and were judged by the am ount of style they and the horse had showed. There were some spectacular falls but none of them seemed to get badly injured. This moved onto riding saddled horses and then bulls with similar results. The bulls were enormous with sharp horns and the safety riders were helped by men who were dressed like clowns and their job seemed to be to run in front of the bull and distract him away from the fallen rider. Once the rodeo riders had completed their 8 seconds the support or safety riders would move in and try to rescue the rider from the bucking animal by riding alongside until the rodeo rider could grab on to the safety man and get away from the bucking horse. The safety men had to calm the bucking horse or bull and get them out of the arena. Some put up a lot more resistance than others.
There was also a section of barrel racing which consisted of young girls riding at full tilt into the arena rounding three barrels and then back across a finishing line.
The show came to an end and we then went for a look round the rest of the show ground. We spent some time in a teepee Indian village and watched various drumming and singing (more like wailing) groups and dancers in full indian costume.
It was then time to go back to main arena for the evening performance. This seemed to consist of a series of heats for chuck wagon racers. Each chuck wagon had four outriders or horseman with them who had to try and catch the chuck wagon. Each chuck wagon had 4 horses pulling them and the horseback riders seemed to have to start standing by the wagon and when the chuck wagons started to race the outriders had to mount their horses and chase after the racing wagons. It was exciting to watch even if we did not understand the rules. The judges would watch a video replay and check if any of the wagons hit any of the barrels they were supposed to go round and whether all the outriders made it home across the finishing line.
After this an enormous stage was towed into the arena and the evening spectacular show started. This seemed to consist of 500 boys and girls dancing and marching. There was also comedians, singers, acrobats, motorcycle ramp jumpers and a lot of fireworks. They seemed to be very keen on the fireworks to such an extent that the fireworks would at time almost drown out the singing performers. It was a magnificent selection of over the top song and dance performances you could imagine and we loved it.
The show ended at midnight we then had to find the car and drive almost two hours back to our hostel in Banff. Altogether it was a wonderful day out and we had to agree with the show headlines “ The Greatest Outdoor Rodeo Show in the World”

---

---