The RV is settled in the synagogue parking lot, and I’m finishing off updating this blog as Trish cooks up a storm for the upcoming three day holiday.  The next blog post will be posted this coming Sunday.

A sweet and happy new year to all!

This morning we played 18 holes of mini-golf at the Oasis RV park before moving the RV to its Shabbos parking location:

We moved the RV to MKT again for Shabbos.  Good Shabbos from Henderson, Nevada!

Yesterday was Tisha B’Av, and the fast went as well as could be expected.  While it’s obvious driving around in Canada that we’re not in the US, within the synagogue walls there’s no difference between Calgary and any synagogue in the US.

We were supposed to leave Calgary today, but our new friend Gary from the synagogue, who works at the Heritage Park here in Calgary, took us into the park as his guests.

On the way over, we noticed that turn lanes in Canada have two red lights.  I’m not sure why:

The first building we visited in the park was a synagogue from the the turn of the century.  Like most of the buildings in the park, it was trucked here from another location in Alberta and restored:

Gary showed us the Sefer Torah in the ark:

Gary shows us around:

Even the maintenance staff are period correct:

We explored the rest of the park:

The park includes amusement park rides from the World War I era:

The blacksmith shop:

A steam locomotive takes visitors around the park:

The grain elevator was powered by a 15-horsepower long-stroke engine, very similar to the engine running the gold stamp at Laws Railroad Museum:

This acrylic window allowed us to see the grain scoops moving inside the elevator:

Here the cart is poised to dump its grain into the weighing area before being scooped up into the elevator:

Shave and a haircut, two bits:

Restroom kitsch:

1920s prairie schoolhouse:

In jail:

Harvester:

Another part of the park focused on the fur trade circa 1870:

This fur stamp was used to compress stacks of furs for bundling and shipping to England:

Surveyor’s cabin:

Massive snowplow railcar:

The house of one of the famous five is here as well:

Our last stop was gasoline alley:

I liked the old pumps even more than the cars:

There was a 1950s RV on display:

The heritage museum was fantastic, and we didn’t get back to the RV until 5:15PM, so we decided to stay a third night in Calgary and leave tomorrow morning.

This morning I went for a pre-breakfast ride.  Heading East from the RV, I soon climbed 200 vertical feet to cross Sunwapta Pass, then descended 1,800 vertical feet on the far side.  Great biking scenery was had throughout:

Of course I had to climb those 1,800 feet back up to the pass, then descended back to the RV.  I was ready for breakfast by the time I got back to the RV!

After breakfast, we hiked cross-country towards the Athabasca Glacier:

As we approached the toe of the glacier, we could see that it was covered in glacial debris:

We hiked up onto the glacier for a bit:

The higher we went, the cleaner and more slippery the glacier became:

We carefully climbed down:

Next we drove East to cross over Bow Summit.  We hiked out to an overlook for Peyto Lake:

The glacial runoff that feeds this lake is rich with silt that gives the lake its turquoise color:

After Peyto Lake, we continued East out of the park to arrive in Calgary.  We’re overnighting in Calgary in the Jewish community tonight and tomorrow night for Tisha B’Av.  See the trip map for driving details and our current location.