This day really didn't allow any time for hiking as I had to make the long drive back to Edmonton. We cleaned up camp and packed up all of our gear. Jim headed off in mid morning to make his way back home to Drumheller. As we put away the firewood that we had left out the night before, Jim came across two Mourning Cloak butterflies that had crawled in between the logs for shelter. They sat on our picnic table for the longest time, too cold to fly away.
I finished up the dishes and packed up the last of the stuff in the trailer before hitting the road by late morning. It was a pretty uneventful drive home with only a couple of stops. At one point I spotted an old corral near Oyen. I thought that this might make an interesting prairie image that might be suitable for the Procession West project. So, I got out my big camera and set up to take a couple of shots. As I was finishing up, there was a big racket off in the distance. About a mile to the north a huge flock of Sandhill Cranes was taking to the air from the field they had stopped in. They circled for a while and the eventually flew right over me, heading south... It was quite the spectacle to witness as they came over me in waves. There must have been at least several hundred of them.
Later I stopped at New Bridgen to check out an old railway water tower. It was interesting, but I just didn't see any composition that justified a black and white shot with the big camera. I also stopped a little further on at an old farm yard where I did shoot a couple sheets of film. After that I just pounded the pavement all the way home, making it back into the city shortly after 6:00PM.
This was the end of the Fall Fossil Weekend for another year. It has become an annual event and we will do it again, around the same time next year. Hopefully Frank and a few other guys can make it next time.
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