Friday, July 8, 2022

Alpacas and gophers and rain, oh my!

 


Before we had ever arrived in Calgary we had heard about the Gopher Hole Museum and it was on our bucket list. Then COVID hit and we didn't really travel. It isn't open year round, either.

Last year friends went to Kirk's Alpaca Farm and had a blast. There's a little shop, picnic benches for lunch, and lots of little kid toys and games around. You can feed the alpacas and hang out with them in their pasture.

These two unique establishments are only 15 minutes away from each other!

You have to book a time with the alpacas because it gets really full. The operation has only been in business a few years and they say each year they are learning a lot, growing the business, and breeding new alpaca babies used to hanging out with humans. They advertised 22 babies and they were so cute!  There's two pastures, one with the moms and babies and one with the males. You get a baggie full of feed and can hang out with them quite a while. Some are happy munching the grasses and some greedily chomp down on handful after handful of feed. The babies were frolicking around. One mom and baby were resting and the mom started growling when I got a little too close. Many seemed unbothered by a little petting of their necks but were more interested in other things to hang around too long. They do have incredibly soft fur. 

We also enjoyed watching the prairie dogs scampering around. They were 100% not freaked out by us humans, with nary a panicked "cheep" to be heard. They were mostly running around, popping out of one hole and into the next. We caught one with a mouth stuffed with grasses - for what purpose we had no idea. 

Next up was the Gopher Hole Museum. Honestly, it was a lot smaller than I had expected - just one room. However, gophers are quite small and the diorama are stacked on top of each other so they fit a lot into the space. The dioramas are quite detailed and pretty humorous. 




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