Some of our early adventures

Our fabulous sponsors invited us to accompany them to Shakespeare on the Bow, which is Calgary's version of Shakespeare in the Park. The performers do one play each year, and this year was Midsummer Night's Dream, which is a perfect pick for us because Alex's class did some Shakespeare a couple of years ago and this was one of the plays. It was a beautiful evening, we were congratulating ourselves on throwing the picnic blanket in the car for our road trip so we had it to use, and the performance was amazingly good - especially for being free/donation requested. We are so excited for next year's season!

The only downside came when Zoltan, playing with the other kids after the performance, fell off the stage and injured his foot. He said he couldn't walk on it so I piggybacked him home - thankfully the performance was only a couple of blocks from our temporary housing. We stayed home the next day and on the day after that, when he still refused to put any weight on his foot, we went to the emergency room.

So far I have exactly one complaint about Canada. Who the heck makes emergency room parking paid?? And you have to pay in advance, so you have to guess how long you'll be there. The nice triage nurse guessed we'd only be there an hour and I should not have trusted that, given that I went back twice to add additional hours to the meter. Otherwise, the whole process went very smoothly, x-rays were taken and reviewed, no breaks were confirmed, and crutches were provided when he still refused to put weight on his foot.

Another Calgary delight our fabulous sponsors let us know about is the Southland Leisure Centre, which (most relevantly) has water slides and a wave pool, as well as ice skating, a gym, and other resources we didn't check out because we were there for the pool.

A final adventure of our first two weeks is the spectacular Calgary Public Library. We got our library cards last week, the kids signed up for the reading challenge, then decided it was their job to finish it with all due haste. I told them if they came back one week later with 40 hours of book reading accomplished the library might not believe them.  The library has a whole indoor play space for the really little kids, a giant chess set, it's huge, roomy, airy, with super available, helpful and friendly librarians. The book checkout stations are throughout the library, not only in one corner at the entrance. There's a cafe inside and a huge variety of seating for reading your finds, from cushions on the floor to a standard reading room with long tables and signs to remember to be quiet.

Between Zoltan's "still injured" foot and house hunting and the weather we still haven't made it to the mountains for hiking. I'm hopeful we get there before too long.

This week will be the last one before the kids start camp and I go to work. Most of our time has been spent either trekking from house to house in hopes of finding our home, or kids reading/playing games while I scour the rental web sites for new houses to see, or going to the grocery store because when you are starting from scratch there are a million things you need to buy.

We went to the State Fair ...

We were definitely surprised when the most expensive hotel room of our road trip was Great Falls, Montana. Until we discovered that the Montana State Fair opened the day before we got to town. And was located 0.2 miles from the hotel.

Terry had mentioned earlier in the day that while we were in Montana we should definitely eat some steaks. We managed to accomplish it on a smaller scale at lunchtime but had planned a steak dinner. Instead, we ended up with fair food. Cheese curds for dinner? Heck, yeah!

The kids were a little whiny as we went from the goats to the bunnies and pigeons and chickens and mules and alpaca. The 4-H club woodworking displays (chairs, benches, etc) were pretty cool. Then we let them loose at the carnival part, where good parents (us) stood in long lines until our feet hurt.

After the carnival came the meal. Cheese curds for the adults, fast food for the kids, funnel cake and fried dough (called elephant ears in Montana) for dessert. Then the hypnotist, then the art exhibit. Then some overtired tantrums and finally bed.

The next day it was up and out the door for the very last stage in this trip - the Crossover Into Canada!!

We got to the border just before noon and decided to get to the other side before stopping for lunch. Major Fail. We spent three hours being processed at the border, something we hope never to repeat as we should have our diplomatic IDs with us for any future border crossings. I was happy for the snacks I always have in my bag, and there was a water fountain by the bathrooms, and the kids had brought their books inside with them, so the whole thing could have been a million times worse. It was, however, seriously uncomfortable. I even eventually went out to the car for more snacks but there is truly nothing like a meal in the middle of the day. And, tip for anyone who might find themselves near the Montana-Alberta main crossing - on the U.S. side there is a little town right along the border. Seriously, we gassed up one last time about 5 minutes from the checkpoint. On the Canada side - nothing for an hour.

The rest of the ride was relatively uneventful. Our fabulous sponsors met us at the apartment and helped us haul in all the luggage. They also left a pile of games for us to play (they seem to be at least as into board games as we are), which has been an enormous help in our downtimes.

The apartment is fine (I keep telling myself). The bedrooms have enough room for the beds and side tables and nothing else. The kids share a room. There is much squabbling from being too close for too long with little else to distract them (how much worse it would have been without the games!)

The best rest stop accidental tourism ever

We had a somewhat longer driving day to get to the North Dakota hotel we had chosen along the route ... chosen because of the water slides in the hotel pool. They did not disappoint. We chose fast food for dinner because of it being, well, fast, and the kids got an hour to play before bed. The next day they dutifully chowed through their breakfast in order to get into the pool for a short while again in the morning before checkout.

Jamestown is a big buffalo place, meaning it is home of the world's largest buffalo!  It's set just on the far end of the Frontier Village, which is a fun depiction of a main street back in frontier days. The kids enjoyed hanging out in the jail and seeing what the post office used to look like.

So far as we knew, there were no tourist sights, things to see, reasons to stop along the road to the next hotel. We drive for a few hours. Then, we see signs for Theodore Roosevelt National Park in two miles. What?? Right then, Terry says he needs to stop and stretch his legs.

We pull off into the Painted Canyon Visitor's Center.  Oh. My. Goodness. The vastness, rugged terrain, and difficulty of adequately capturing it on film reminded me of the Grand Canyon. We decide to take the (described as) half hour hike into the canyon. The kids whine they are hot and tired. Then they see a couple that had passed us on the trail not ten minutes before were near the top of one of the peaks in the canyon and they are energized. It was a fun hike up, much more challenging getting down the thing because some of the soil was a bit pebbly so we weren't as sure of our footing. Heading back out of the canyon was a bit more challenging than what we are used to, because we are all in horrible shape and moving probably faster than we really needed to.

We've all heard of Yellowstone, Yosemite and Glacier. How had we never heard of TR National Park? He is practically the reason we have any national parks at all!