The Badlands at Drumheller
Go see some dinosaurs
I've taken a few runs at in, but I'd never actually seen the Royal
Tyrrell Museum in Drumheller. Our stay in Calgary was winding to
a close and I wasn't going to miss it for the third time. The
drive from Calgary was mostly quick - in no time we were out in the
flat fields. Seeing the badlands come up was quite a surprise.
The
Museum
itself was quite good - many of the exhibits were real fossils and the
casts were labeled as such (unlike some other other
institutions.) The museum was well organized, and you do learn as
you go. The audio wands are useless - they are 80% of whats on
the signs, and 20% new material. For people who have a degree
(but not in dead stuff), the material was a little thin - more depth
and analysis would be appreciated.
We had to reverse the car ride out and I wasn't keen on a long ride
without taking a walk first. The badlands is a cross between
desert and a drainage ditch - a dry environment with lots of hills,
gullies and detail depending on depth. Having just come from the
rockies, it was a completely different environment. Rather than
just
shoot like mad, I limited myself to just one roll of film, and just one
lens - my Nikkor 80-200 f/2.8 AFS (not much of a hardship, I know).
It never ceases to amaze me life hanging on in marginal conditions.
Grass covered most good land, but when the going got tough so did the
plants. The bush is growing on the last remnants of uneroded
soil - a few good rain storms and it's roots may be gone. The
Cactus were growing in the grass and only on the sunny sides of hills -
I think the conditions were just starting to get bad enough for them to
thrive.
So we went for a walk. Some areas are broad walkways with
stairs. As you get further back, the trails become narrower and
the stairs disappear. Mike, alway the climber, found on of the
larger domes and went for a climb. We followed him up.
Tags: desert(6), hiking(2), erosion(2), plant(2), Do Not Tag(2), mud(2)
People: David(4), Jeremy(3), Michael(3), Mark(2), John(1)
From: John Harvey Photo > Banff in Mid Week > Drumheller
From: John Harvey Photo > John's Overnight Page > Banff in Mid Week > Drumheller
Last Modified Saturday, January 21st, 2023 at 23:41:16 Edit
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