Hey everyone! I’m not dead yet! Quite the opposite, actually. We just got back from a school trip to Calgary for a week!

So what did we do on our trip to Calgary, Alberta? Why would we drive for hours on end just to go to a cold city? Continue reading to find out!

In case this isn’t obvious, we didn’t start in Calgary. The first place we stoped at was the Last Spike in Craigellachie (Cray-gal-i-key). The Last Spike area is the area where the last spike was driven into the Canadian Pacific Railway, the railway the goes from the Pacific to the Atlantic Ocean. This specific spike is important to the history of most of Canada because being able to move people and goods across Canada, and it marks when British Columbia became part of Canada.

After we spent some time at the Last Spike, we went off to a hotel/château called 3 Valley Gap. While there we visited the ghost town that was connected to the château. During that time we were spit into groups of 4 to make a fictional video centred around the ghost town. My group, consisting of Emily, Adlih, Luca.O.G, and myself. We decided to make a video about a ghost cowboy who needed to find his lost treasure. Luca was the cowboy, Adlih and I were the school kids on a field trip to the ghost town, and Emily was the teacher. I think it turned out really well, but I wish we could have prepared a bit more than we did.

https://youtu.be/piNpKl70g60

After the first night at 3 Valley Gap we headed off to the Rogers Pass Discovery Centre in, you guessed it, Rogers Pass. Rogers Pass is a well maintained road that goes through the mountains, but it was originally build at a railway. We watched a short movie about why Rogers Pass is so dangerous and what people do to keep it as safe as possible. Turns out when in the middle of snow mountains, there’s a lot of avalanches, so authorities do controlled avalanches to keep it as safe as possible. Trained military guys come out with a large cannon and fire explosive rounds the size of a fire extinguisher into the mountain. If an avalanche occurs, a large section of the mountain has been cleared of dangerous snow. If one doesn’t, then there’s no dangerous snow at the moment.one highlight was when Luca. J stood near one of the statues they had outside and it looked like she had giant pants and a tiny torso.

Next was lunch, also at our next stop, The Northern Lights Wildlife Wolf Centre. The centre raises wolves for a few different reasons. The first and slightly outdated reason if for the film industry. These people raised grey wolves so they could star in movies, TV shows, etc. But now they’re more of a conservation centre. Grey Wolves are endangered in Canadian National Parks, and people seem to think that wolves are the really deadly creatures. With how bad of a spotlight wolves have gotten with fairytales like little red riding hood, 3 little pigs and more, people fear these creatures. And for very little reason, too. Wolves get attacked and killed by hunters and the wolves aren’t doing anything wrong. So the wolf centre takes in injured wolves and brings them back to health. And, at the end of it all, we got to pet one of the wolves that was super friendly and was literally just a big fluffy dog.

For our last stop of the day we stoped in Banff (the town inside the park) and went to the history museum. The museum was honestly… kinda boring. There were just a bunch of animal statues, heads, and horns. And while I did get some cool photos, the most interesting thing in the museum was a board game that Mrs. Willemse and I lost to Kailey. And we lost by a lot. Darn you Kailey with your totally luck-based winning strategy!

Third day: start! We just stayed in Calgary this day, and the first thing up was The Locked Room. The Locked Room is a bit different than what it sounds like. We were split into 3 groups, and each group was locked in a different room. We were given a hour to complete puzzles, riddles, and different tasks to find a key to open the door. My group was Lucas, Luca.O.G, Maggie, Adlih, And Lauren. We were unable to open the door in the first hour given to us, but we did get it done because we were given another 45 minutes. This is because we were in one of the least completed challenges at the facility. There is a leaderboard in the lobby, and your groups name goes on the board if you win within the time frame AND without getting hints. We didn’t do either of those so technically we didn’t “complete” the challenge, we still got out the door.

After we had some lunch at Wendy’s, we went to the Glenbow Museum in Calgary. Glenbow is an art and history museum filled with old artifacts, minerals and crystals, history about Canada, Calgary, and more. We first stoped to meet our tour guide in the lobby, the went up to the 4th floor. There, we learned about the history of the museum and it’s owner. Glenbow was first created by a man named Glenbow who fought in WW1. After coming back from the war, he didn’t want to just sit down and retire. He decided to go explore the world, collecting artifacts, trinkets and other items throughout his journey. Eventually, his wife got upset that all the stuff he had collected was just inside their house, and she told him to get rid of some of it. He thought, “why not both” and opened up a museum for all this artifacts. Great story, right? I thought so.
After the story we went around the exhibits some more, looked at fancy gems and minerals, got some upside down photos, and learned a lot about First Nations in the Alberta area. One thing that was super interesting to me was that First Nations in Alberta moved a lot. Their tipis were able to be transported easily and they didn’t build Long Houses. Quite different from First Nations in British Columbia.

Normally I wouldn’t talk about meals. They’re probably not as interesting as the places we went to. But if Mr. Hughes is reading this, I should probably mention the Endless Shrimp at Red Lobster. PLP has a tradition to eat as many shrimp as we can during Endless Shrimp. Those who are participating are given a little card, and we eat as many Shrimp as we like. We then write down how many shrimp we ate in that round. My record is 43, but heard Kai ate about 100.

Dinosaurs! Today we drove to Drumheller, and the Royal Tyrrell museum of Palaeontology. A Dinosaur museum. I could go on for paragraphs about how cool Royal Tyrell was, but Ishould limit myself. Firstly, I have been to Drumheller twice now. Once  a week ago and once a few years ago. Secondly, i made a video about one of the best preserved Dino skulls in the museum. Check it out below once you’re done here. Third was something actually new to me. We were given a tour of the Badlands, the area around Drumheller.

https://youtu.be/c6w5ErXNwLg

I actually have two vids from Drumheller. The first is above, talking about one of the best preserved skulls in the museum. The second is below. We had a surprise video to make, in which we found a dinosaur within the museum. We had to make a short video talking about said Dinosaur. I found the Ornithomimus to be quite interesting. It was one of the few reptiles that had feathers. While the feathers didn’t let it fly, the decorative wings may have been used to attract a mate.

https://youtu.be/4w4bwsMaJZs

Aaand… thats about all we did for that day. For dinner we went to a place that served delicious chicken wings, but i had eaten something that day that my body didn’t like. Needless to say i was feeling pretty bad for rest of the trip.

Ok, here’s what we’ve all been waiting for. The main event we came to see, PotionTop!
Wait, thats not right. The actual event was Beakerhead (see, i was close), and the different exhibits were spread across the city. For those who don’t know, Beakerhead is an art, science, and engineering event where people from around Canada and the world build stuff like giant claw machines and huge fire breathing snakes. In the morning and afternoon we walked around doing different activities such as the claw machine and getting lessons on how to spin a wooden pole around your neck. We did see the giant snake, but it was on and breathing fire after dinner and in the evening.

Speaking of the evening, i was very upset to see that we would be out from 7pm for 5 Hours. However, we did see the snake in action and we saw the egg it was protecting. When the egg hatched, pillars of fire shot out of the egg. I was a good 15-20 meters away and my face was getting warm. We also saw this exhibit called Musical Cubes. The people had set up a tent with this cuboidal structure inside. Some of the faces of the cubes had buttons on them that sent a signal across the river to these lights. Pressing the button changed the colours on the lights, and we had fun figuring out which button changed which light. Last but not least was a library with a bunch of projectors in it. To be honest, i was so tired and nauseous at the time that i forgot what was supposed to be going on. On one floor there was “where the wild things are” projected onto the wall. On another there was some people playing a 6 person game, and i dont even remember what was on the bottom floor. But afterwards we went straight back to the hotel.

My last night in this hotel wasn’t a good one. Stomach cramps mixed with being keep awake late didnt help me feel any better. Thankfully a lot of the day was riding in a bus. After that sleep we finished our final Beakerhead event. It was the Calgary Municipal Space Station. There, the beakerhead people set up something they called the Space Elevator. The Space Elevator project is exactly as it sounds. The top of the tower was redecorated to be like a Space station, and the elevator up to the top was supposed to be an elevator up to the station. The station itself was cool, but the elevator ride up was awesome! I got to use a device that I’ve never used before, a VR headset. For those who don’t know, VR stands for Virtual Reality. This headset I like a small screen that you wear over your eyes like a mask. The device itself has a gyroscope in it, so it can tell where you’re looking. With certain videos playing, you can look around and see things behind you, to the side, whatever. It’s pretty cool.

After lunch we drove to the Cave and Basin National historic site. This is where the Europeans discovered the first natural hotspring in Canada. We went on a tour of the area, with a tour guide who acted out different stereotypes of the people at the time. What’s interesting is that the main building had a cave in it that led to the spring. We weren’t allowed to go swimming in it because A: it was a public area. And B: the water was sulphuric, so we would melt (slowly). We were there for about two hours, and then we went to the next stop.

After, we drove to Lake Minnewanka for a boat cruse. The captain drove us around the lake, while the co-captain was our tour guide. He told us about the lake, the surrounding forests, even the famous lake monster. The story of the monster starts with a fisherman. He begins to claim that a monster lives in the lake, and starts selling boat tours to the public. The public begins to think that the man is crazy, and ask for proof of this monster. So the man sets out, and actually catches the monster. The monster is terrifying, the upper half of a rotting human corpse with the tail of a large fish. But thats exactly what it is. The man had animal parts shipped in from around the world to make this fake monster. Of course, the public saw through the fake monster, and stoped believing the lies the man said.

The next stop was a hotspring we could actually swim in! At the Banff upper hot springs, the spring water is filtered into a large, shallow pool. People can pay to swim in it, and those that do are given a towel, and as much time in the pool as they want. I didnt go, however, because I forgot my swimming stuff.

This night was definitely the worst of them all. Unlike all the other nights, we slept in a Hostel. For those who don’t know, a hostel is one large room with about 6 bunk beds in them. So all the girls slept in one room, while all the boys slept in another. At this point, i was too tired to care about getting ready for bed. It was late, so i just slept in my clothes.

The next day we went on a glacier walk. At the Columbia icefield, we were driven up a glacier in a really cool glacier bus. While on the glacier, we were shown a small creek that we could fill our water bottles in. I did, and then drank it all throughout the day. The next thing that we did was the glacier skywalk. Imagine a glass bridge over a large canyon. I didnt go, because im scared of heights and was really tired. Mrs. Willemse and I spent the next hour and a half just chilling on the front deck of the ice field centre.

Next up: lake Louise. Lake Louise is a beautiful lake of runoff glacier water. There is a hotel at the lake, but it was way to expensive for us. I had actually been to lake Louise before, but didn’t remember until i had spent some time there.

That night was an actually decent sleep. We stayed at a Holiday Express in Golden. I got an actually decent sleep that night, but not enough sleep.

Despite being the last day, we still had a lot of things to do. Well, ok. It wasn’t “a lot” a lot, but the single thing we did have to do was draining. In the Enchanted Forest (an odd outdoor fairy tale themed art museum), we had to make a fictional video. We were in groups, and we had two hours to think of, shoot, and edit a fictional fairy tale video. I was in a group with Daniel, Luca J, Jamie, and Luca O.G. We came up with a pretty interesting idea. Jamie and I were evil mages, bent on stealing the queens (Luca J) fortune and power. After kidnaping the queen, we run into the queens two sons, played by Daniel and Luca O.G. Jamie gives Daniel a poisoned apple, he dies and luca O.G. Sets off to kill us. The end.

The rest of the day was driving back to the school. The music on the bus got better until finally we were singing “final countdown as we pulled up to the school. After a short wait, i was home and in a decent bed for the first time in a week. And we all lived happily ever after.

The end.