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Horseback riding in Lake Louise (part 2)

August 4, 2011 We climbed up to a tea house on top of another mountain. The place was really crowded by tourists and everyone was getting food and drinks. Perhaps not surprisingly, I skipped the meal and went running around to take pictures of the place. I belive this is the lake that flows into the waterfalls and into Lake Louise. It ... [more]

Horseback riding in Lake Louise (part 1)

August 4, 2011 Instead of spending more time in Calgary (which, to be fair, does seem to be an interesting city), I had a horseback riding day planned around Lake Louise. I'm really glad I decided to do that! The place is one of the most beautiful I have seen in the world so far... Here's my car parked in front of ... [more]

The drive southward and into the Canadian Rockies

August 2, 2011 I left Fort McMurray early in the Morning and had an oil change after four and a half hours in Edmonton. My initial plan was to reach Calgary (about three hours and a half from Edmonton) and find a place to stay there for the night. Plans quickly changed, however, and I decided to go horseback riding for five ... [more]

Can’t drive in to see the oil sands operations? Let’s rent a plane to fly over them! (Part 2)

August 2, 2011 This is the second and last part of our plane tour of Fort McMurray and the oil sands operations. Throughout most of the flight I had the window down and I was sticking my head, arms and camera out of the plane to take pictures (you get clearer pictures and much better colours and contrast when there's no ... [more]

Can’t drive in to see the oil sands operations? Let’s rent a plane to fly over them! (Part 1)

August 1, 2011 These images were all taken in Fort McMurray, where we decided to charter a plane to fly over the oil sands operations (they don't let you just drive in to see them: I tried). This was an amazing experience, and after we split the cost, it ended up being pretty cheap! This is the plane we flew: One man, ... [more]

Fort McMurray in plain sight

July 29, 2011 Fort McMurray is all about the oil sand exploitation industry. Oil sands have just recently been counted amongst the world oil reserves: before petrol prices skyrocketed a few years ago, extracting oil from the sand was too costly for the business to be made profitable. I'm skipping the technical details. You can read all about it here on Wikipedia. This ... [more]

From Edmonton to Fort McMurray

July 29, 2011 On my way out of Edmonton, I caught a glimpse of the Muttart Conservatory (they are gardens). I didn't get a chance to visit but it does look like a very interesting place! Bye bye Edmonton! There is this big Indian building on the way out of the city, just on the side of the highway. Am I really back ... [more]

From Regina to Edmonton and West Edmonton Mall

July 26, 2011 Continuing my long trip from Chicago to Edmonton: this is just after leaving Regina towards Saskatoon. There wasn't much to do in either city so it made sense to just drive by. Lots of beautiful prairies! You can tell we're approaching the West by the amount of hills! More cereal along the road: This is a photo of the sky: Water! It's ... [more]

From Winnipeg to Regina: a whole lot of scenic prairies

July 25, 2011 The prairies are full of bright yellow fields like this one: Here is what the people of Manitoba look like in their vehicles: A lot of the highways I took weren't even paved! This made for an even more interesting drive. Tractors doing what tractors do: You can see at a distance vehicles moving on the highway, leaving behind them impressive dust ... [more]

From Chicago to Winnipeg: a late night adventure

July 25, 2011 Just after coming out of Willis Tower (I got a souvenir tee shirt and a coffee mug!) I set off again for Winnipeg. The american highways are awesome. Here's a bit of roadside scenery: After a while, when it was completely dark, I ran into a bit of a problem on the road. There was some debris on the ... [more]