Category: landscape

Alberta’s Red Rock Coulee Natural Area

Robin
Red Rock Coulee Natural Area, Alberta

  Standing on the valley rim, we peer into a rugged coulee of badland formations. Between the eroded slopes, native prairie covers the undulating treeless landscape where wildflower blossoms vie for space among the needle-and-thread grass, sagebrush and junipers. What really grabs our attention is the sea of scattered curling rock-shaped boulders, most a dazzling reddish-orange. Many are massive, up to 2.5 metres across, and… Read moreAlberta’s Red Rock Coulee Natural Area

Road Trip Through Manitoba’s Waterfall Alley

Robin
Pisew Falls

Massive walls of water thunder over a fault line. Cataracts and rapids twist through a narrow canyon. Most intriguing of all, a rapid-filled spring seems to gush mysteriously from a solid rock wall. The best part is that all of these spectacular natural features are easily accessible along a paved highway following the Grass River in northwestern Manitoba.   The river became famous during the… Read moreRoad Trip Through Manitoba’s Waterfall Alley

Battle Creek Road Trip – History and Spectacular Scenery

Robin
Battle Creek Road, Cypress Hills, Alberta

Flowing through both the Alberta and Saskatchewan sections of Cypress Hills Interprovincial Park, plus Fort Walsh National Historic Site, Battle Creek is one of the shorter waterways on the Canadian Prairies. Yet, few can match it for the mix of history and scenery around every corner of its meandering course.     Located at the northern extent of the Gulf of Mexico watershed, the creek… Read moreBattle Creek Road Trip – History and Spectacular Scenery

Exploring the Columbia Icefields

Robin
Ice Explorer

The massive Columbia Icefield is the highlight of the spectacular Icefields Parkway, a driving route of 230 kilometres between Lake Louise and Jasper in the Canadian Rockies. Encompassing parts of Banff and Jasper National Parks, you can see seven major glaciers and around 25 smaller ones along the way. Things really get interesting about half way along where glacier tongues extending from the Columbia Icefield… Read moreExploring the Columbia Icefields

Hoodoo Hunting in Dinosaur Provincial Park

Robin
Hoodoos in evening light, Dinosaur Provincial Park, Alberta

  Approaching Dinosaur Provincial Park in southeast Alberta, we come to a valley rim where the land suddenly drops into a vast expanse of spectacular badlands, the largest anywhere in Canada. The park was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in part because of the landscape, but also because it has the world’s largest deposits of dinosaur fossils from the Late Cretaceous period – about… Read moreHoodoo Hunting in Dinosaur Provincial Park