Ride to the Top

On Saturday Anna and I took a long ATV ride.  We rode up the mountain behind the Nordegg townsite.  We followed some old abandoned roads that are now converted to ATV trails.  These lead past some old coal mine workings and a couple of other sites.  I'm not sure if those other sites were oil and gas wells, or perhaps boreholes checking coal seams.  In any event it is all abandoned now.

We spooked a Mule Deer buck with his antlers in full velvet.  He was resting in a sunny spot beside the trail when we drove by.  He bounded off into the bush, but on our return ride back down, we spooked him a second time from the same spot.

The view from the top of the mountain is usually quite spectacular.  You can see all the way west to the main range of the Rocky Mountains along the Alberta-British Columbia border.  On this day the skies were so heavy with smoke that there were no mountains visible.

But as a consolation, there were lots of wildflowers blooming all over the place.  I watched the odometer on the ATV and it was a 30km round trip from the cottage to the top of the mountain and back down.  A great way to spend a summer afternoon...!