To Fish Creek Provincial Park and Back

For quite some time now I have wanted to take a looooong bike adventure along the Bow, since I knew that there are paved bike pathways all the way along, and recently have been inspired by another Calgary blogger to visit a teahouse in Fish Creek Park, so Sunday was the day we picked to make our trip.

The day did not dawn bright and sunny...there were threatening thunder clouds as we left and we biked through a storm on our return trip. We figure it was between forty and fifty km round trip from our house in the NW all the way down to Fish Creek and back. Technically we should have been able to bike along the Bow River Pathway the whole way, but at one point fairly close the park, without warning the trail was cut off by chainlink fence. We had to backtrack a long way in order to get around that section of the path. It made us so mad, I think I'm going to call 311 and complain about it. At least they could have given us some warning or suggested an alternate route.

Nevertheless, we saw a very beautiful side of Calgary. Old houses from several eras of building, the skyscape of downtown, the Inglewood Bird Sanctuary, Prince's Island Park, Carburn Park, lots and lots of wildlife and natural plant growth, and of course, our destination, the quiet grassland of Fish Creek Park. (Incidentally, my mum told us afterwards that she went to the first annual Calgary Folk Music Festival at Fish Creek Park in 1975. How about that?).

Pelicans on the weir; waiting for fish to come over:

Checking out the CPR yards:

Saskatoons are ripe! I tried some:

At last, we've arrived:

Above is the Bow Valley Ranche in the distance. Below is the inside of Annie's Bakery, which used to be the ranch foreman's house. I had tea and scones, which weren't quite as civilized as some of the ones we had in England, but were tasty nonetheless.

William Roper Hull's home at Midnapore. I wrote a paper about this house once. It's gorgeous. There was a wedding taking place while we were there, so we didn't get too close.

The park, in large and small:

Commemoration of women's efforts in the early farm economy:

Blue herons on the other side of the weir on our route homeward:

Reading the signs at the weir: