Out into the Wilds of Alberta

After church and a quick lunch, we packed up the cars and headed out to my aunt and uncle's property about two hours north west of Calgary. My dad went with my uncle in his truck, while my aunt, the dog and I went in our rental car. The drive our was awesome - the property is at the end of a road and backs onto crown land so it really is in the middle of nowhere, and the views of the mountains from the highway were great! It was a "fun" experience trying drive the last 100m of road before their property line though - thick mud! My aunt and I paused about 30 seconds to debate wether or not to just walk the rest of the way, but figured we'd just go for it. She was a bit nervous though as I almost went sliding sideways into their gate! (Front wheel drive cars are not made for this sort of thing!)

My dad and uncle where at the property before us and went ATV-ing, but were back pretty soon. We then walked around the archery range my uncle had made - a bunch of 3D foam animal targets. Even though he has all the distances memorized, he still got me to determing the range before firing. My dad and I tried to pull his bow, but with a 75 lb draw, we didn't get too far!

Our next weapon demonstration was the riffle - a 7mm Remmington something or other (he told me, but I can't remember these things!) I got to go first, aiming at the gap between 2 trees ... can't miss that! My third shot was at a stump - I'm not sure if I hit the stump or something else, but a piece of wood came flying up from somewhere.

After my dad did his shots, we headed back to the 5th wheel to warm up while my uncle went off searching for a deer (though I would have been surprised if we hadn't scared them all away).

The next activity was driving the rhino (ATV) around the property. My uncle made a trail around the edge of the property, including 2 bridges over ditches (cut down a tree and split it lengthwise). He told my dad to keep the edge of the wheel 1" over from the edge of the bridge - my dad had interpreted that as 1" of bridge showing, but I interpreted it as 1" of wheel hanging off the side. At the first bridge, my dad kept asking me to make sure I was only an inch over because when he looked down, we were hanging over by at least 2" ... which means that he was probably hanging over by 4"! The first bridge also has the nice characteristic of DROPPING on the right side just as you get all the wheels on the bridge! I think it needs some reinforcement.

It was dark when we got back to the trailer and figured out what the dog had been doing while we were out - she must have done a lot of climbing and jumping to get on top of the stove and to our loaf of bread ... and eat half of it! We ate the rest - it was still delicious. Along with that we had some fruit and barbequed white tail buck that my uncle shot last year on this property.

My dad and I left just after 7pm to head up to Rocky Mountain House, but first, we had to get the car our of the gravel. I was sure that I had parked on hard ground, so was a bit surprised when my uncle called us to say that my dad was stuck (he was turning the car around for me). It was only after a bunch of pushing that only seemed to move the car sideways and my dad getting out and pushing, that I noticed that he hadn't taken off the parking brake! (Explains why we couldn't get it to rock!) The rest of the drive was uneventful.

We found my cousin's place by GPS coordinates (easier than looking for road signs in the dark) and were able to spend a bit of time with her husband before heading over to their awesome guest cabin. It isn't quite finished yet (no door nobs, etc.), but had everything we needed plus more!