Last Thursday morning when I left home the trees were covered with a delicate coating of lacy hoar frost and looked beautiful against a blue sky. As I drove down our street, I thought I should stop and take a picture, but decided to wait until I arrived in Taber. Well by the time I arrived at the edge of the city and turned onto highway three fog covered the countryside and scattered snow flurries were falling. It snowed intermittently all the way to Taber. In some places the less used lane was totally covered. I took a picture in Taber, but without the blue sky it just wasn't the same.
Sue-anne's Street in TaberSue-anne joined me in Taber and we drove to Brooks where we stopped for a short time and said, "Hell0" to my brother and sister-in-law at their place of business.
On we went to Hanna where we stopped and had lunch with my other brother and sister-in-law and my nephew and his wife.
After we left Hanna, we did have some blue sky for a while but it sooned turned to cloud and fog again. That was the last blue sky we saw the whole three days we were away. We drove to Elk Point where we had booked a motel room. All the rooms around Cold Lake and Bonnyville had been booked long before Sue-anne thought of booking.
The Sign at the Elk Point MotelElk Point is not very big, but there was a take-out Pizza Hut where we got pizza for supper.
It is well over an hours drive from Elk Point to the J.J. Parr Arena on the Cold Lake Air Force Base. We left quite early the next morning to get there but we had some problems. "Our Lady of the GPS" wanted us to take some gravel roads and we followed her advice but we didn't see any gravel. The road was more like a snowmobile trail and we followed it to within sight of the highway we were to turn on when there was a chain blocking off the road and we had to turn around and go back the way we came.
It is well over an hours drive from Elk Point to the J.J. Parr Arena on the Cold Lake Air Force Base. We left quite early the next morning to get there but we had some problems. "Our Lady of the GPS" wanted us to take some gravel roads and we followed her advice but we didn't see any gravel. The road was more like a snowmobile trail and we followed it to within sight of the highway we were to turn on when there was a chain blocking off the road and we had to turn around and go back the way we came.
Our Snowmobile Trail
View from the Snowmobile TrailThe next place "Our Lady" wanted us to turn was into a road that led to the back gate at the Airforce base, but because there was a sign that said the gate wasn't always open and because we no longer trusted her we decided to use a map and find the arena ourselves. We got to Cold Lake and drove around the town for some time before giving up and stopping at a service station to get directions.
We watched skating all day - at least Sue-anne did. There were only cold metal benches with no backs, so I only watched Taylor's group. The rest of the time I read books on Sue-anne's kindle. (For those of you who have never seen a kindle - I recommend them. I was even able to download a book while we were driving down the highway. I wish I would have had one in China.)
Taylor skated against fifteen other girls and earned the bronze medal.
We watched skating all day - at least Sue-anne did. There were only cold metal benches with no backs, so I only watched Taylor's group. The rest of the time I read books on Sue-anne's kindle. (For those of you who have never seen a kindle - I recommend them. I was even able to download a book while we were driving down the highway. I wish I would have had one in China.)
Taylor skated against fifteen other girls and earned the bronze medal.
After the skating, Sue-anne and I drove back to Elk Point to our motel.
Our Motel Room
View from the Motel
A Way to Keep Fresh Towels.The cart stayed outside all night. It had folded towels in the front and unfolded ones at the back. They were all covered with frost.
In the morning we decided to leave for home rather than backtrack to Cold Lake to watch some other sport. Before we left we had to visit the 100 foot mural that Elk Point is noted for. It was painted and researched by Billie Milholland and marks 80 years of Settlement in Elk Point. It was very cold so we didn't get out and walk close enough to read the history on the mural. In fact, I thought I would just roll down my window and take a picture from the car.
In the morning we decided to leave for home rather than backtrack to Cold Lake to watch some other sport. Before we left we had to visit the 100 foot mural that Elk Point is noted for. It was painted and researched by Billie Milholland and marks 80 years of Settlement in Elk Point. It was very cold so we didn't get out and walk close enough to read the history on the mural. In fact, I thought I would just roll down my window and take a picture from the car.
The Elk Point MuralAs I may never be back to that part of the country, we decided to detour over to Vegreville to see the big Ukrainian Easter Egg. Again we listened to the GPS lady and we did fine except for one township road she took us on - certainly not as bad as the Snowmobile trail.
Road into Vegreville
The Revolving Easter Egg
We made one more stop along the way home and that was at Cactus Corner (corner of highway 36 and highway 9)to eat lunch. The rest of the trip through the fog was uneventful.
1 comment:
That was a very eventful trip. I can't believe all the things that could go wrong on one trip. But at least you took pictures and recorded the events. :) I am so proud of Taylor! That is amazing.
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