11. Day 6 – Rich farming land from Grande Prairie to Edmonton
Saturday 13 May 2006
We departed the Wal Mart car park at 9am and headed on what we call our “transport stage” to the Glacier National Park in Montana. From Dick’s flying visits to Canada it is obvious we will mainly be on big highways and farming country until then. It was 52 degrees F outside, getting warmer all the time.
We slept the night in Dawson Creek’s Wal Mart car parkMorning break at Crooked Creek
In sunny weather, we drove through the city of Grande Prairie which appeared to be a very wealthy town based on the oil and gas industry as well as farming. We stopped near Crooked Creek for brunch. A local farmer stopped beside our vehicle and asked us in for a cup of coffee however as we had just had one we decided to keep going. He commented that all of his property now had oil and gas discovered underneath. He didn’t seem too impressed as he didn’t own the rights! The scene as we traveled was of farmland with newly ploughed paddocks, scattered oil pumping derricks and the occasional timber yards with piles of birch logs.
Piles of logs waiting to be made into particle boardA farm near Crooked CreekOil and gas wellsPaper making plant at WhitecourtA farm with silos that we passed heading into Edmonton
Just before the town of Little Smoky we saw our first road kill, a dead deer. What a contrast with Australia, by this distance we would have seen hundreds of dead animals. Presumably there are less fatalities on North American roads because most of their animals are not nocturnal.
We performed a fuel test to see how far the vehicle would drive on the front tank. It ran out at 544 miles (875km), giving an average of 12 miles per gallon. (44.20 US gallons was its capacity).
Fields near WhitecourtTimber trestle railway bridge
At 2.30pm we pulled over for lunch of salad sandwiches and a good old cup of tea.
We stopped for lunchDick talking to Macca on a Sunday morning
It is now a warm day of 60 degrees F outside. At 3.30pm we stopped and Dick did a live interview with Macca on Australia All Over using our cell phone. Amazingly we turned on our laptop computer and used Google to key in ABC radio and 2BL and listened to Australia All Over show via the internet. We have a small Verizon CDMA Card which allows us wideband connection virtually anywhere we can get mobile phone communication.
Pip on the laptop computer
We keyed ‘West Edmonton Mall’ into the GPS and it took us, with Australian voice accents, straight to the outdoor car park of the most amazing shopping centre in the world. Not only hundreds of shops but a huge funpark with a roller coaster and an indoor surfing beach, which operates in the middle of winter.
Inside a part of West Edmonton Mall
After 3 hours in the shopping centre we drove out and parked in a nearby Wal Mart car park for the night.
Parked overnight at Edmonton’s Wal Mart car park
Because our Earthroamer is completely self contained and solar powered with batteries, we do not need to connect to outside power or run a generator.
