Our Tenth Canadian Province - We've Made It

Well today is a big day on our holiday. This afternoon (Wednesday 15th of August 2018 at 15:07) we entered Alberta, the last of the Canadian Provinces we have not visited. With British Columbia in 2009, the three Maritimes and Newfoundland in 2011 and Ontario in 2015 we have this year added Quebec, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta to our travels - making it 10 out of 10.

Haydn celebrating making it to all 10 Canadian Provinces

Drew and Captain Jack celebrating too

But before we focus on our celebration, a review of the day.

Our Route

Today's route was another simple one, and a shorter one than the last two days. The simple reason being geography. If we hadn't stopped at Medicine Hat we would have had to travel a lot further, and maybe even all the way to Banff itself. So we decided it would be a reasonable stop on the journey, even if there was nothing much there. The route went like this:

Regina to Medicine Hat - Trans Canada Highway

Breakfast

Today started, for me, at 4.15am (this would have been 6.15am two days and two time zones ago, so is really a good lie-in.) 

I made coffee for Drew at 5.00am, as usual. This was in an old fashioned coffee pot in keeping with the nature of the hotel. We went down to breakfast at 7.15am

For the first time this holiday, breakfast was not a good experience. We choose Choice Hotels when we can because, after many years travelling in North America, we know the standards of the rooms - clean and functional, but fine. But more importantly that we know the standards of the breakfast, generous and simple. But today's breakfast can only be described as mean. A lady appeared as we entered the breakfast room and asked: "Do you want ham and eggs" we both said yes. When it came it was the skimpiest piece of ham you have seen and one fried egg. During breakfast, the lady was constantly cleaning, on two occasions in the short time we were there she took people's plates away, and cleaned their tables while they had only got up for a little more of the limited food. This intrusiveness made me wonder what would happen if we had asked for more, would we be treated like Oliver Twist was by Mr Bumble? The non-cooked food was also limited, everything was wrapped in cling film, rather than in the fresh containers elsewhere. And items like bread and muffins weren't replaced until the initial amounts were gone, in line with the rationing the lady in the kitchen seemed to be managing. This is well below the Quality Inn standard and I'll be saying so to them (and on Google and TripAdvisor).  

<<Co-pilot's note: He is, dear readers, being quite generous. He is leaving out the anecdote about the poor couple we were sat next to us, to whom she went on a fifteen minute rant about her boyfriend, his playing of Assassin's Creed and her forthcoming trip to Egypt - which they are going to because it is in the Assassin's Creed game.

She then proceeded to explain that she had never been east of Winnipeg in her life - they were from Nova Scotia>>

A measly Ham and Eggs

A mini muffin in clingfilm

On the Road

So we didn't take long over breakfast and were out of the hotel at 8.00am. The temperature was 62°F, cool but not uncomfortable. We stopped for petrol at a Petro-Canada station a few metres down the road. Like Winnipeg, prices here in Regina are the cheapest we have seen in Canada - $1.18 (this is 71p per litre). 

The Rough Guide offers this for today's journey: "the 400km drive from Regina to Medicine Hat is monotonous" and while there was an occasional hill and a few reservoirs and salt farms the description was otherwise true. 

Second Breakfast

After the breakfast fail at the Quality Hotel we decided to treat ourselves to a real breakfast along the road. So we left the highway at the town of Moose Jaw at 9am (it was 75°F by then). 

We parked on Main Street at a parking meter and went in search of breakfast. A street along we came to Veroba's Family Restaurant which was just what we needed. We, and twenty or so Moose Jaw residents, opted for the Breakfast Special. I had sausage with eggs over hard and rye toast, this came with lovely lightly fried potatoes mixed with onion, red pepper and ham. 

Haydn's Sausage and Eggs, Over Hard - Verbona's

Drew went with bacon and had his eggs sunny side up with white toast. 

Drew's Bacon and Eggs, sunny side up

Moose Jaw

On leaving the restaurant we strolled down to the centre of Moose Jaw and went to the Moose Jaw Tunnel exhibition. Moose Jaw, like other towns used tunnels for people to move around underground in the depth of winter. Unlike many other places Moose Jaw preserved their tunnels and now use them as a place for historical exhibitions and enactments. 

We opted to go on one of the tours and were shown how the Chinese people of the town were treated in the turn of the century. Many of them not coming above ground for a long time. 

Our guide was Dawson and as well as having a phenomenal acting ability, switching from his own commentary to other people's voices with great ease, he certainly knew his history of this place. The exploitation of the Chinese workers by the railroads and others is not a story of which Canada is proud, but it is one made very explicit here in Moose Jaw, with the laundry, where one worker who went on to become a herbalist and has great grandchildren in Canada today is the focus of the story, as the family history is better known than that of others.

Going in to the Laundry where Chinese Immigrants were exploited and lived underground.

The public face of the library was very different from the private

Back on the road through Saskatchewan

The temperature rose to 85℉ as the day progressed and we continued to drive at a good pace through the state. The horizon was a very strange colour and the blue skies of yesterday were all gone. Indeed the sky seemed very ominous, not fog, but like fog, not clouds, but simply like the sun was being blotted out. Later in the day we discovered that this problem was the result of the forest fires to the north of the province, and what we were seeing was smoke which had come 100s of miles in the upper atmosphere.  

The Prairie landscape like yesterday but now with smog?

Bails of hay in the gloom of a darkened sky

We came to a large plant which was producing salt. Indeed there were salt mountains on either side of the road.

Salt Production

We stopped to change drivers at the Tim Hortons in Swift Current. Drew had a Vanilla Dip and I had the Four Cheese Bagel with cream cheese.

Bagel and Donut

As we continued we saw more flat land, but with the occasional production plant.

Another large train running alongside the highway - the sky is dark and ominous 

The Train goes into the factory - Again note the smoky sky

Even though the sun is blotted out, the temperature continues to rise, so that as we came to the edge of Saskatchewan the outside temperature was 90℉ (32℃).

Into Alberta

As highlighted at the start of today's blog post, as we approached the Atlanta provincial line we got excited about out achievements. When I in 2013 and Drew in 2015 made it to the last of our 48 contiguous US states it was a day of celebration. So today it is the same as we celebrate making it to all 10 Canadian Provinces. 

Welcome to Alberta

While the provincial line was in an hilly area, we were soon on to the flat prairie lands again, and the journey remained like that until we got to Medicine Hat our stop for the night.

Alberta Prairie

Medicine Hat

In our run up to Medicine Hat we had seen lots of signs for the 'Tallest Teepee in the World'. So we decided to pass our hotel and go for a visit to the Teepee. While this metal erection is of a significant size, it was most interesting for the images and stories of the sight within the construction. On this site the First Nation tribes had kept a sacred place where they could meet in peace to negotiate their use of the land, and other things. The Blackfoot, who were the early people of this land, were threatened by the Cree from the east and the Stoney from the North, and the site of the Teepee was to ensure they various peoples could meet and agree their arrangements, not fight over them.

The Tallest Teepee in the World!

How Medicine Hat got its name - image

How Medicine Hat got its name - text

Leaving the Teepee we drove through Medicine Hat centre, it is a very small industrial town so we came to our hotel. 

We arrived at the hotel, the Comfort Inn and Suites, Medicine Hat, at 4.30pm. It was a modern hotel with lovely rooms, a nice change from the night before. 

The spacious Room 318, Comfort Inn and Suites, Medicine Hat

Drew noticed they had a fitness centre and he went running in hotel gym at 5.10pm while I uploaded all the photos that had not gone up since Winnipeg. Drew returned soon after 6pm at 7.15 we went out for dinner. 

Dinner

The location of our hotel, right on the side of the SK1, Trans-Canada Highway, meant that we either had to walk to somewhere close to the sight, or drive. As with the other evenings we find it easier not to drive in the dark, so we opted for the restaurant that shared a car park with our hotel, so was simple to walk too. 

This was called Perkins. Perkins is a Canadian chain of restaurants that focuses on American style food.

For starters I had a sampler place of Onion rings with chipotle sauce, Fried pickles with ranch and Crispy tots. As Drew called it: A bit of fried everything. It was crispy, but probably more than I intended to eat as a starter. 

Haydn's generous starter

Drew opted for Fried pickles as a single dish, so his starters were a more reasonable size.

Fried Pickles and Ranch Sauce

I then went for a Frisco burger, which was the inside of a burger, but served in sourdough bread for which San Francisco is famous. While this was not haute cuisine, there is something nice in the occasional blow out, and on this day that we had made it to all 10 provinces, I felt I deserved it.

Haydn's Main Course

Drew had a Classic Cheeseburger with fries which was a very juicy burger without to many frills.

Drew's Main

We walked back the 100 meters to the hotel and were in bed by 11.00 pm.