Week ending Aug 11, 2016 Rosemary to Vulcan

Saturday, took in the Brooks Medieval Faire.   We arrived shortly after the gates opened at 9:30 so were able to get parking close to the site.  The parking recommendations for the Faire mentioned places as far away as Safeway and Walmart, which are at least 2.5 km away.  For people that didn't want to walk that far, one of the industrial yards close to the gates was providing parking for the day for only $5, and there were a few people taking advantage of it.

There were lots of people on the grounds in period costume, including some kids.

We walked through the vendor area, which was primarily stuff for costumes, with a other crafts.  We took in the 3v3 fighting melee, a battle between Edmonton and Calgary groups. 

We listened to the Hibikiya drum team.

We watched 3 kids having a sword fight. They have strict rules of behaviour.

The highlight was the jousting tournament, with representatives from  England, Quebec, Sweden, Australia and Strathmore  and a judge from Belgium.  We were surprised that about half of the jousters were women. 

 Sunday we watched the NASCAR race.  It was a rainy day anyway.

Monday, we moved to Vulcan.

Tuesday we did a 4km walk around town.  Then we went to the local laundry and discovered that they only have cold water for washing clothes now.  We decided to go to the next nearest laundry, in High River.  So we bought some groceries and had lunch there, instead of spending our money in Vulcan.

Wednesday, spent the morning figuring out how many airmiles would expire at the end of this year, by viewing the transaction history using the maximum months on the pop-up, then changing the range=-11 in the URL generated to -55.  That showed us all the details from January 1, 2012 until present, along with the total of all of the air miles since then.  

Thursday morning, we did a 5km, following the full route of the walking trail around town.  When we got back to the campground, there was another Titanium setting up.  It was the lady that we had met last summer in Enchant, and then again in Bow City.  We chatted with her for a while.  

We will be spending the rest of the summer in the Calgary area, so will not post new blogs until we leave Cochrane on October 14.

We will be in:
Vulcan    until Mon, Aug 15
Irricana  until Sat, Aug 20
Cochrane  until Wed, Aug 31 
Olds      until Wed, Sep 7
Banff     until Wed, Sep 14
Cochrane  until Fri, Oct 14

Week ending Aug 4, 2016 Pincher Creek to Rosemary

Friday, we talked to Dad.  George headed for Bowden around 11, and we headed to the farmers market to pick up some fresh veggies.

Saturday,  we did part of the Pincher Creek walking tour on the south side of town, then to the west side of town along the Creek.

Wagon by golf course

The Pincers sculpture

 

Sunday  we walked out along Mcleod Road east of the campground to the seniors (65+) fish pond (2 fish allowed per day), and ball diamonds, to the cemetery, then returned on a different route past Perfect Posies Greenhouses.

Seniors' Fish Pond

Perfect Posies

Our NASCAR race from Pocono was delayed until Monday due to the rain. 

Monday  we packed up.  The slideouts did okay going, using the old process of jacking up the frame.   We stopped in Lethbridge for groceries, then carried on to Rosemary. Only one other unit in the campground.  We were expecting 15 amp power, but have 30 amp.  We are on a water connection after using the tanks for 3 weeks.  It will be nice not listening to the water pump.   However, the sites are just barely long enough for us, and they are a bit soft.  After getting lined up, we noticed an 'Engine Power Reduced' message on the truck's dash. Yikes.   
  
Tuesday morning we got an e-mail from our friend Janet, who was in Fort McLeod on her way to her brother's in Saskatoon.  We replied with our phone number, and she picked up the email before she left, so called us and arranged to stop and visit with us for a few hours.   It was good catching up with her in person.

Then we had a short chat with our fellow 'campers' here.  He was working on a sidecar for his motorcycle.  We found out that they are from Switzerland, currently living in an old class C in the RV park. They shipped a couple of motorcycles from Thailand to Canada.  They are preparing to live in a tent for the winter in Canada.   At the end of their year here, they plan to go to St. Pierre and Miquelon, the islands in the Gulf of St. Lawrence that are part of France, so they have officially returned to Europe, so they can renew their visas to return to Canada for one more year.

Wednesday morning, we took the truck to Brooks Motor Products to find out why it had a 'Engine Power Reduced' message.  It had two issues; a really dusty air filter and a defective airflow sensor.   They also fixed the TPMS relearn issue, which they figure was caused by a low battery in the truck remote control, which is used to initiate the relearn issue.    They didn't fix the remote, but they did get rid of the tire pressure relearn message and the low tire pressure indicator.   It was a very windy, slightly rainy morning, so we couldn't do the historic downtown walk while we waited for the truck to be done.  Fortunately it was done by 10:00, so we didn't wait long to get it done after we went for breakfast and picked up a couple of items.

To add insult to injury today, once we got back to the trailer, John's exercise ball suddenly split halfway around. 

Thursday morning  was beautiful day, so we did the self-guided walk around Rosemary using the walking map of the village which shows where all the previous businesses and sites of interest were located.  We started by walking along the irrigation canal on the west side of town.  When we couldn't find the recommended route away from the canal, because it was through thick grass, and a bit of a swamp, we hurried back to the trailer to put on mosquito repellent.  After yesterday's rain, the mosquitos were out in full flock.  We carried on with the full route.  We noticed a lot of the houses had little receivers of some kind on them, all pointing toward a particular location.  We stopped to chat with a family that were cleaning up the flower beds at the Mennonite church.  The receivers are for internet access through EIDNET(Eastern Irrigation District).  We saw the tower just off the northeast corner of town.  The bakery that we stopped at a couple of years ago on a stop here has been closed since last year.  We picked up some chips at the General Store, and some ground pork at Spragg's Meats.

R.L Henderson sketch done in 1976