Day 89 - Cowboy Town

Calgary is kinda like a giant Tamworth, cowboy sort of city. The tourist information guides at the airport are all walking around with cowboy hats and it isn't out of place to see numerous people with these types of hats. Eventually got going this morning and a block away from the hostel is this mural which I really like:



I was walking around today with the aim of taking some photos, more beautiful blue sky. I heard a band start playing, ah de ja vu with all the times this has happened before leading to some blind stupid luck. I walked around the corner and there was a full military ceremony.



Basically, it was the 95th aniversary of some division so they were being welcomed into the city. They had an array of army personal carriers. This was cool cause I just stood in one spot, they were driving past slowly so I could get lots of reference photos of vehicles without even having to move from my spot.



After this I continued to wonder down to where Fort Calgary was ... or what was left of it. This was pretty much the extent of it.



Right next to the fort was this building. It was a reconstruction of the original police/RCMP barracks which currently houses a museum on the history of Calgary that I went into. Inside it was lots of reconstructed rooms and time periods similar to the Western Development Museum that I saw in Saskatoon.



The thing that struck me about Calgary and Saskatoon is that they aren't really old cities in the scheme of things. Calgary was nothing until the first police outpost in 1883 and Saskatoon was formed around the same time.

I guess coming from Australia, the large cities (Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne) all grew out of penal villages almost right away. America's discovered in 1492 and ok things probably didn't get going until the 1600s but not having settlements (not even cities) forming until the late 1800s just seems really strange. Although it is interesting to note this was on the back of the 'coming of the railway' so I guess there are access considerations.

Anyhow, 'nuff about that. Next up wandered further down south and came to this stadium, the Saddledome. Naturally it is appropriate in a cowboy like city to have your main sports stadium in the form of a saddle.



Been wandering around for a bit so thought I would head back to the hostel for a breather and to recharge my camera batteries. Along the way I took this photo which I kinda liked.



Calgary at night is relatively dead. The main downtown area is closed with next to nothing open. I had problems finding something to eat last night as all convience stores, restaurants (including McDonalds) seemed to be closed by 2100. Only thing opened where smoke filled pubs.

My guidebook did manage to point me in the direction of this large garden area ... on the 4th floor of a building! It was huge with plants, water fountains, fish, sculptures etc all over the place. This photo just shows a tiny little section. The great thing about it was it was deserted. I had the whole place to myself. Occasionally a security guard would walk past but that was about the extent of it.



The garden also had this cool sculpture from the 1850s. Unfortunately it was in a hard spot to look at, let alone photograph.