The Last of Them

These are the last of my phone snapshots from the recent trip down to East Coulee.  After our visit to the Royal Tyrrell Museum, Helena and I picked up a couple of pizzas from our favorite place, Pizza 249.  We headed back out to the trailer in East Coulee with them.  We met up with Frank and Chris and the shop and they shared some pizza with us, and we stayed up late visiting.

The next day it is still rather cold and wet from all the rain and snow.  So we went out for a little drive and toured around the area.  We ended up back at the Newcastle to play pool a second time.  The owners of the establishment are East Indian, and their attached restaurant specializes in East Indian food.  We never tried the food, but both times we played pool they served us a plate of what I believe are nan chips.  I really liked them, though Helena thought they were nothing special.

Later we went back to the Vintage pub so that Helena could get a second dose of her Mac and Cheese.  When we got back out to the trailer in East Coulee, Helena wanted to go out for a night walk around town.  I was freezing, and in the midst of fighting off a bad cold, that I still have to this day.  I didn't really want to go, but I humored her and went along.  We wandered over to the playground by the school, and down by the river, before eventually returning to the trailer.  This was the last night of our five night stay in the valley.  The next morning we packed up and tidied the trailer and hit the road for home.  We did remember to make a stop at the self serve vegetable shack and picked up a few things for back home.

 

 

Billiards

After we finished up at the Museum, Helena and I headed over to the old Newcastle Hotel, now called the Dinosaur Hotel.  It was the middle of the afternoon on a weekday, so we were the only ones in the place.  I had a couple of beers, and Helena got into the rum and coke, after finding a Strongbow cider not to her liking.  We got some change from the bartender and I attempted to teach Helena how to play eight ball.  She did alright, for a first try.  At one point I bounced the cue ball off of the table and into the ladies room.  She made me go in and get it.  It's a good thing there was no one else around.  We really enjoyed the afternoon and ever since, Helena is anxious to go and play pool again.  I guess I'll have to drag her out to some more dive bars in the future.  Dad of the year candidate...!!

 

 

Change in the Weather

On October 23rd Helena and I awoke in the trailer and looked outside to find the overnight rain was turning to snow.  It got fairly white before the snow eventually quit around noon. 

We headed into town and Helena checked out some of the shops in downtown Drumheller.  She went to Tugs, a collectibles place downtown, and picked up a T-shirt and a couple things.  Then we went to the Rockin' Cowboy and I bought her a cowboy hat.

After we finished checking everything out in town we headed over to the Royal Tyrrell Museum and wandered through all the paleontology exhibits.  It had been at least a dozen years since I last toured the museum, though Helena had visited earlier this year.  It is always spectacular to see all the exhibits and a great way to spend an afternoon when the weather is less than ideal.

 

 

More from October 22

We got back to the shop in the middle of the afternoon on October 22nd.  Helena decided that she just wanted to chill for a while.  I really wanted to get out and take a few photographs while the fall light was so beautiful.  This was particularly compelling because the weather was forecast called for conditions to take a turn for the worse the next day.

I left Helena at the trailer and headed down the valley to catch the last of the afternoon light.  I stopped at an old directional sign along the highway and photographed it.  Then I made my way over to a cottonwood grove and caught some of the last of the fall colors.

By the time I got back to the shop after an hour or so of shooting, the day was coming to an end.  Helena and I drove into town and had dinner at the Vintage Pub in the historical Alexandra Hotel.  She had some Mac and Cheese that she claims was the best she ever had.  She liked it so much that we ended up going back for more a couple of days later.  

We played cards in the pub, watched some sports on TV, had a couple of drinks, and then later we made our way back to the trailer and settled in for the evening.

 

 

Snapshots from October 22

On the morning of October 22nd Helena and I got up.  We used a hammer and broke open all of the concretions that we had collected the day before.  One of them contained a nice clam fossil.  This was really exciting for Helena and she wanted to go back to the lake and collect more.  So, we headed out back to the same area that we had explored the evening before.  

It seems that the area had been used as a bit of a garbage dump in years passed.  Aside from the two old trucks that we previously photographed, there were also some old oil drums, and various other junk.  Some old farm machinery had been dumped down on the shore of the lake, and we found a bunch of old bottles.

This time we brought the hammer along with us, and smacked open all of the concretions that we found.  Sadly none of them contained any fossils.  This was somewhat disappointing to Helena, so after a couple of hours we decided to head back to the shop.

 

 

Even more from October 21

As we made our way back towards East Coulee on the afternoon of October 21st, Helena and I decided to stop at Carolside Reservoir.  I knew that marine fossils were relatively common in this area.  In fact the guys at the Dinosaur Valley Studios shop made a cast of a Mosasaur skeleton that is mounted at the entrance to the park.  It is based on a specimen that was found in the area.

Helena and I stopped at an old farm yard.  There were still a couple old trucks and some machinery lying around, but in years past there was also an old house.  The house is now gone.  I photographed the trucks and a hay rake with my big camera.  These are some phone snapshots that I took as we were wandering around. We also explored a little down on the beach and collected a bunch of concretions.  The next morning we broke them open and one of them contained a nice fossil of a clam.

After wrapping up our day of exploring we headed into Drumheller and went to Yavis', a local pub, for dinner.  After dinner we returned to East Coulee and settled down in the trailer for the night. 

 

 

More from October 21

By earlier afternoon on October 21st, Helena and I decided to leave Dinosaur Park and explore some new areas.  We headed northeast of the park, to the north of Jenner.  We drove down into the valley of the Red Deer River.  There was some reasonable badlands exposure, but it was some distance from the road, and the property was fenced and gated.  By this point it was getting to be late afternoon, and we just didn't have the time to hike that far.  The days are pretty short at this time of year, which yields that wonderful clear fall side light all day, but it gets dark by about 5:30 or 6:00.  We wandered around for a bit and then decided to start making our way back in the general direction of East Coulee.

 

 

Some Phone Snapshots

These are some phone snapshots from the afternoon that Helena and I spent at Dinosaur Provincial Park.  This was on October 21st.  It was a glorious day, with clear skies, hardly any wind, and temperatures up around +21C.  There were very few people in the park, and we only saw a couple of others while we were out walking the trails.  I took these phone snapshots, plus a half dozen or so with my big camera, before we moved on to explore other stuff.