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Published: August 22nd 2011
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Its been a while since the last post, a lot of bushwhack camping without internet nearby.
We left Dauphin with the goal of getting to Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan. We got a good start on the day after being mostly packed from the dry-out the night before. We made it to Regina around two P.M. and had a ride through town. It seemed a bit lackluster, so we just breezed through down town on our way out of town and on to Moose Jaw.
The city of Moose Jaw (yes, that is the real name), was established in the early 1880s when the rail road came through. The primary use of town was to load the piles of bison bones onto rail cars to be processes for fertilizer. A few decades later, Regina banned prostitution and Moose Jaw became a seedy town of ill repute. With this as the town's history they played host to Al Capone, amongst other bootleggers bringing Canadian whiskey in during Prohibition. The tour costed $28, so we decided it wasn't that important.
We blew out of town to find a place to camp, and just such a place existed. We saw a dirt road
that looked like it led to a small lake with a nice peninsula out in the water with the end covered from the road by a patch of bushes. We rode out there and noticed how the road got kind of strange out near the end, and realized that the road had been flooded out buy the water. We then realized that this was flood water from the nearby river. We got to building a fire and get some food cooking before we set up the tent, just to keep a little better hidden from the road. This drove Leche CRAZY! She wanted nothing more than to curl up somewhere warm and all that was available was a lap that didn't keep still. After trying our horrible aim with the pellet gun we set up the tent and put a very grateful dog to bed.
While we were sitting by the camp fire Dan saw a huge salamander a couple feet away from him. It was odd because the salamander kept getting closer to Dan. At one point we got the camera and took some really close-up photos of it. It was Docile and kept wriggling forward toward Dan.
Dan pushed the creature back with a stick, not knowing its intentions, and then it started getting closer to the fire. It kept walking closer and closer to the coals near the edge until it burned itself and writhed in pain and flipped out of the fire. Then it started going back in! It repeated this a couple times before it was burned so bad that it couldn't escape and began to cook!
We crashed soon after the excitement and got a good rest before packing up with the goal of getting just past Medicine Hat, Alberta (yes, that is the real name too). We rode for a good stretch before we had lunch in Medicine Hat and blew town to go bushwhack again. We rode down the dirt road rim of a canal to a place with a few trees to keep us mostly hidden from nearby houses. We set up camp quickly and got to cooking a great campfire meal. We played frisbee with the light-up frisbee in the dark for a half an hour before finally calling it a night.when we noticed the storm on the horizon was getting closer.
We were a bit better
rehearsed on the drill of rain prep after Riding Mountain. We got everything covered and the rain started to fall. But it never got heavy and stopped after half an hour. We slept well and woke up to a chilly morning.
The final approach to Calgary was on. We rolled into town and got the the hostel around two. We unpacked, had a rest and went to the casino across the street. We spent a couple hours there and Dan walked out with a smile on his face. We then wanted to ride around downtown for a bit to get a feel for the city. We stopped off at a tap room to get beer before heading back to the hostel to go out with a group of people staying there. We walked a few blocks away to the Ship & Anchor, where I had my first good Canadian beer. We ended up going to another bar with this Australian girl and it turned out to be a mostly empty gay club. We got in a cab and called it a night.
The next part of the story is in the previous blog
http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/Canada/Alberta/Calgary/blog-636122.html
We are
in Banff right now recovering a long day hanging out with my (Bryon's) parents and Grandma. We all went up to Lake Louise and had lunch at a pic-nick table on the way back to Banff. They came here to take Leche off our hands while we are in bear and cougar country. We also gave them a bunch of gear we won't need for at least a month. We are excited to do some trail riding and hiking n the next couple of days around here before heading out on our north-bound adventure!
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Safety47
Robert Glassford
Dogs gone wild
Leche is a rock star but it must be somewhat of a relief to drop her of with the rent's & not have to worry about her. Tink & Toby looked for her for a couple days after Y'all left. They would run around the house& check the yard to no avail.