Birding

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As we left Lethbridge, Canada we saw two versions of the spelling of the river - Oldman River or Old Man River. Hmm, a big river, but not a match for the Mississippi. We traveled on a beautiful 4-lane highway over the rolling prairie with hardly any other traffic.
We arrived in Red Deer early, so Nancy went birding in a wildlife sanctuary. Rich and Daisy went shopping and then read under a shady tree while they waited. No dogs were allowed in the sanctuary. It was a 2 1/2 mile hike around a couple of lakes and up and down some hills, so Nancy had a workout!
She added two birds to her list. One was the red-necked grebe. It was carrying two babies on its back! So cute! She watched some beavers gathering food, a nice branch loaded with leaves that it swam with out to the lodge. Later, at a bird-watching blind, a beaver swam right under the deck and then stopped on the other to munch pond weeds. Nancy got a good look at it eating. Then a duck flew down and landed near the beaver. It started quacking and she thought maybe the duck was worried about the beaver being too near her nest. But, no! All her little babies started paddling out from among the cattails Where she had told them to stay while she went off to eat. Nancy also got one new wildflower on the walk, too, a white Canada violet.

June 29th
We drove a couple of hours to a campground outside Edmonton. We relaxed and then went grocery shopping. Just as we got the groceries inside the camper, there was a big thunderstorm that lasted quite a while. After dinner, we took a walk around the campground and along the Saskatchewan River. When we got back, we were surprised that it was 10:00. Since it was still light, we thought it was maybe 8:30.
We're in the town of Devon. It's a nice little town. People are making the best of the nice weather by brightening up their yards with lots of flowers. You can tell this must be a cold place in the winter with the winds blowing and the blizzards bringing snow across the mostly flat prairie. On our other travels, northern Minnesota in particular, it seemed as though people were resigned to the cold weather and didn't even bother to landscape their yards or plant flowers in the summer.

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