After a nice two and half day visit with our daughter Lindsay in Calgary, Monday dawned dark, dreary and wet. Times a passin’ so its time to hit the highway and continue our journey. Today’s destination is Cypress Hills Interprovincial Park, the Alberta side, in Elkwater Alberta.

Eschewing the usual route going south we head south east of Calgary along the secondary highways that crisscross southern Alberta. Down Highway 24 then 23 through Mossleigh and Vulcan where we stop to view the town’s claim to fame, the tribute to the Starship Enterprise and it’s famous crew including Spock, the pointy-eared Vulcan and Capt Kirk’s sidekick. Spock is famous for his life philosophy, ” Live Long and Prosper. I for one will follow his sage advice.

Back on the road we continue south through Kirkcaldy, Champion and Carmangay until we hit Highway 3 just west of Lethbridge. Lethbridge’s was first established in the late 1860’s as a whiskey trading fort aptly nicknamed Fort Whoop-up. The NWMP came through in 1874 and provided law and order and stayed for 12 years. Later in the 1870’s and early 1880’s, coal was king.

We continue along Highway 3 to Medicine Hat then east to Highway 41 then south to the Cypress Hills Interprovincial Park.

The first European to visit the Cypress Hills area was English explorer and fur trader Anthony Henday in 1754. Later, in 1859, John Palliser led an expedition through the area, describing the hills as “a perfect oasis in the desert”. The area was the locale of many forts working the illegal whiskey trade. The Cypress Hills Massacre of June 01,1873 was the impetus for the establishment of the North West Mounted Police and in June of 1875, Inspector James Walsh established Fort Walsh in southwestern Saskatchewan to bring Canadian Law and Authority to the area.

In 1931 the Saskatchewan government established Cypress Hills Provincial Park. The Alberta government followed twenty years later with the establishment of a provincial park on the Alberta side. In 1989 they were combined to form Canada’s first Interprovincial Park. And so here we are tonight. Truly a national treasure. Verdant, rolling green hills and valleys. You can almost hear the grain crops growing after all the rain. As we roll south on Highway 41 I think I can see the “Hills” rising up through the mist. Hopefully tomorrow will clear and we will get a better sense of their presence. Tonight we drift off to the sounds of the mosquitos buzzing at the door, trying to get to us. Lather on the DEET.