Welcome to Sunny Southern Alberta

This is JUNE people!!

What the Heck?

Dinosaur Park

This past weekend we headed to Dinosaur Provincial Park. We ended up taking the long way to get there.........but that is a whole other story!

This is our camp!

This may help a little bit better!

We decided that it was an alright place to stay, we just wouldn't want to be there for more than a weekend at a time.

The major highlight of the place are the Huddu's. On Saturday morning, before it got too hot, we went for a hike. Here is a picture of the campground from the first 'level'.

During the hike, they warn you to beware of rattlesnakes and scorpions.......

......they forgot to warn us about these things!!

Here are some pictures of the scenery from various heights on the Huddu's.

This one's my favorite!

The whole gang!

We are just starting the hike all the way up to the top.It's kinda hard to see, but there are people on the top in this picture. That is where we were!

At the top.

View back down at the campground from the top.

Proof that I was there too!

Friends playing and climbing on the Huddu's.

Not sure if the park's staff planned this or not. It got up to 34 degrees in the sun on Saturday afternoon and what a relief it was to see the big sprinklers going.

We all got cooled off quite nicely.

Here are the Thorpe's.

Lori, Teagan, Elizabeth & Blair.

We have a few more weekends booked with them.

Lori & me.

Don't they look like they are having fun?

On Sunday morning before we packed up, we all went for a bike ride around the loop road. Carter wasn't having fun and found it kinda hard to pedal in the gravel with his training wheels. Just before we left camp, I asked Mark to throw in a rope or something to pull Carter when he doesn't want to keep going. Good thing!

Here comes the rest of the crew up the big hill.

I think we may go back next year. We found out as we were leaving, that you can float down the river. We will have to take some floatation devices next time.......it would have felt good with it being sooooo hot!

I'm still needing to get used to this camping in Alberta. The next location we head to has a lake. We'll have to do some more comparing!!

Camping - Elkwater - May Long '09

Our camping season has finally started!!

We were a bit worried that the weather wasn't going to cooperate with us, since it snowed the week before we were to leave! It was a great weekend and we all had a fun time. The only problem we encountered was that the boys do not like the vaulted toilets. Can you blame them?

Here is our campsite.

The kids had a great time riding bikes to and from the playground, playing badminton and volleyball and playing trucks in the dirt.

Last year when we went out to Elkwater, we took a little hike. The boys remembered that and wanted to go again.

The boys had to get some walking sticks and then they were all set!

This is my attempt at a family shot on the trail.....
.........we may have lost Logan!

(I had a picture of Carter here. Not sure where it went!)

I then tried to get a couple shots of just the boys. They really didn't want to get their picture taken.

Mark wasn't to excited to get his picture taken either.

Logan and Elizabeth hanging out at camp.

I think they were just eating a bag of chips between the two of them!

Carter and Teagan hung out in the Thorpe's trailer doing princess puzzles. HUH?

I was also given my birthday present (really early) from Lori. It was great timing! She gave me a camping chair with a heater in it! It runs on a battery, that you charge, and it keeps your butt and back toasty warm. Thanks Lori!!

We are looking forward to the next trip!

Visiting in Lethbridge

Greg, Dawn and the girls were in Lethbridge on the weekend for a Highland dance competition so we thought we would take the drive down and see them. We made it just in time to watch Courtney do her final dance and then we waited with them for the results. Raya got a ribbon for participating and both Makenna and Courtney got second place in the sword dance. I wasn't sure what that was and I was a bit concerned. Turns out that they place two swords on the ground and they dance around them. Way to go girls!!

Makenna, Raya & Courtney

Carter was a little bored waiting, so he decided to take some pictures with my camera.

He got a pretty good one of Uncle Greg!

After the competition, we grabbed some take out and went back to the hotel and the kids went down to the pool and water slide. I was a bit shocked that the pool wasn't really little kid friendly and the water slide was REALLY fast! Mark said that his stomach dropped on the last corner every time.

I tried getting a picture of someone coming out of the slide and this is always what I got. Not even sure who this is!
Greg and Mark were soon in a competition themselves to see who could 'skip' across the pool the furthest. When Mark came out the one time, all you could see were legs! Fairly entertaining.


These two don't look like trouble at all!!

Logan could just barely touch after coming out of the slide. He had Mark, Greg and Courtney help him a number of times.

Carter wasn't interested at all in the water slide.

He preferred the hot tub.

Everyone played hard for over and hour!

Just before we left, Auntie Dawn got a little snuggle with Carter as he explained to her about a show on teletoon.

I really thought the boys would crash in the truck on the way home.......no such luck!

Thanks for the visit guys! Let us know when you're coming back this way.