Hanging Around the Cypress Hills

We made an effort to see the best parts of Cypress Hills (now an inter-provincial park) by visiting Fort Walsh in the morning, and doing some walking in the Cypress Hills in the afternoon.

To get to Fort Walsh, we had to return through Maple Creek, which had some interesting road signs as well as a farmer's market in process.

Eastern Canada, especially in Ontario, is focused on the history of the War of 1812.  That is totally irrelevant to what was happening in the south of Saskatchewan and Alberta.

Fort Walsh was established as a NWMP outpost to establish law and order in the aftermath of a war between the US and Lakota Indians.  The Indians, headed by Chief Sitting Bull, moved as refuges to Canada to escape retaliation.  The commander of the unit, William Walsh, established a well-respected outpost, first with 30 constables, then growing to 300 constables, for a brief period in the late 1800’s.

It was not an easy life for the first arrivals.

(This was the site of the first breeding and training for the black mounts of the RCMP Musical Ride, until budget cuts finally moved the section to Ottawa.)

I didn’t take many pictures, for much of the site was reconstructed, but the prison accoutrements were impressive. (Ball and chain, locked handcuffs, etc)

Some ball and chain--it was really heavy!  The rules for prisoners were extremely strict as well, and minor sentences were a mere 2 years less a day of hard labour.

Apparently, Fort Walsh had a magnificent deterrence value from holding two 9-lb cannons. 

Their riflery was legend, so it didn't require use of the cannons, but they did have a big ace card to play.

The terrain of Cypress Hills is fascinating, for it was the only part of Canada that wasn’t glaciated due to its height.  There are deep valleys with trees, surrounded by prairie grasslands for miles.

In the afternoon, we went walking on a trail.  This was the first warning sign we encountered.

We did not meet cougar, but we did see white-tailed deer, a red squirrel, and finally a grouse.  We stopped and made (what we hoped were) grouse sounds, and it appeared to work, because we had a good back-and-forth conversation consisting of a number of clucks and chirrs for several minutes.  The bird was literally about 5 feet away from us.

Driving back to Medicine Hat, Brian saw a scene he couldn’t resist—another example of farm yard art.

Albertans are apparently quite careful of their privacy.  This was the sign near the farm yard art.

What can I say?!