Road Trip

We took a road trip this weekend to Grande Prairie. I had no idea how bloody far it was from Yellowknife to Grande Prairie. Five hours to the Alberta border and another seven to Peace River.

The longest drive is highway 1 from Yellowknife to Alberta which is riddled with bison. They wander all over the road, and sometimes you have to park on the side of the highway and wait for the herd to move. Mammoth things, those bison. They are about the size of a baby elephant and they move at their own pace regardless of what you do. Here is a shot from the passenger window of the car. I had to look up at the massive thing.

We spent the first night at 60th Parallel Provincial Park. The 60th denotes the arctic region from the rest of Canada and the border between NWT and Alberta. It offers your typical selection of wide-eyed sunrises and unbelievable sights. When the sun rose, it ignited the mists on the Hay River into great blooms of orange and red. I tried to take a picture, but it couldn't possibly do it justice.

We saw the usual compliment of bears, elk, caribou, rabbits and foxes.

Once we got into Alberta, it was a long drive through prairie flatness and we were able to see forests and trees as opposed to the stunted growth customary to the north sub-arctic. Grande Prairie offered us 27 degree C. weather, which was nice to have again.