Crid's 1999 Grand Tour of Canada

3 weeks travelling by train from Toronto to Vancouver

Day 12 (Wednesday) - Edmonton

The Provincial Museum has exhibits on wildlife, geology and the original Canadian natives.  The wildlife dioramas were particularly good, with curved backdrop paintings which are very well painted.

From the museum I walked downtown and spent a while in the shopping malls.  Like Winnipeg, they are linked together with raised walkways.  Some buildings are also linked below ground level.  Some of the buildings are empty though - victims of the success of the out-of-town malls.

After grabbing a fajita (I'm hooked), I headed back outside and found a wooden stairway which goes down the side of the hill from the Hotel McDonald to the river.  I ended up at the Muttart Conservatory - four huge glass pyramids housing plants from various parts of the world.  One of the pyramids was closed, but the other three had tropical, arid and temperate climates.  A nice way to relax after all that walking.  (Except when one of the gardeners in the tropical zone didn't notice me when he was using a hose to water some of the plants).

From the conservatory I walked back to Vance's parents' house.  A couple of miles I guess.  It was a nice afternoon (although I wish I hadn't taken my jacket with me - I ended up carrying it virtually all day).

Washed a few more clothes and then Vance arrived.  The plan for the evening had been to try the Space and Science Centre again.  Alas, Vance's van started making a funny noise on the way there, then we had smoke coming from under the bonnet.

It turned out that his alternator belt had snapped.  We managed to find somewhere to buy a replacement belt, but they were not able to fit it.  So back we went to Vance's parents'.  Vance was going to get his dad to look at it for him, but unfortunately he was out walking the dog at the time.

So we borrowed his mum's car and had another go.  By the time we got to the Space and Science Centre, it was after 8pm and it was closed.  So instead we headed for the WEM (again) and saw a 3D IMAX movie instead.

The movie was pretty good.  It was partly fun, partly documentary.  It had two robots in it who reminded me of Tom Servo and Crow from MST3K.  There was also a trailer for Fantasia 2000, which is going to be released in IMAX format from 1/1/2000.  Looks very good.

One of the other trailers was for the T-Rex film I saw in Winnipeg, except that this time it was in 3D.  It was noticeably better in 3D than when I saw it in 2D.

On returning to Vance's parents' (no Northern Lights tonight, sadly), we discovered that the reason for the alternator belt failure was that the alternator itself was broken.

Packed my rucksack (at past midnight) and I'm pretty much ready to leave.  It'll be a shame to leave Edmonton - I've really enjoyed my (brief) stay here.

 

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