July 10th, 2001

I get up early in the morning, no breakfast. Around 7:30am I start on my way from Winnipeg to the west. In a little grocery store I get some food and 20 minutes later a bus drops me off at the city border. After a short trip with some young guys I get a lift from a tax lawyer specialized on farmers and who invites me for breakfast. An hour later I am back to the highway trying to get a ride. Here hitch hiking isn't prohibited, but not very successful either. Most cars rush past (at speeds of 120 kph), I rather try to stop one of the cars that enter the highway. After some time a retired farmer stops who speaks a little bit German. His grandparents came to Canada about 80 years ago and he is here for over 80 years now telling stories from former times. He takes me along to Austin, where I am lucky to find a new lift not much later. Dave, a guitar player in a jazz band, and Matt, who builds guitar and is a hobby farmer, are on their way back from the Montreal Jazz Festival. Dave drops off Matt in Regina and goes on to Moose Jaw. Here I get off and have to stand in fine but continuous rain. From Winnipeg I am about 655 km away, not a bad result for a late afternoon.

Moose Jaw is a rather small town and a trap for hitch hikers. It continues to rain for the next 4 hours and 3 other people try the same impossible thing - to get out of here. People in passing cars only stare at me, later I even ask around at a nearby gas station, but no luck. Finally I set up my bivy bag underneath a bridge, preparing me a hot vegetable-meat-rice stew. For the noise made by trucks and cars I get surprisingly much sleep this night until a truck stops right under the bridge. Two guys get out und go for a pee. I am about to tell them not to pee into my living room, but rather be quiet and undiscovered.

July 11th, 2001

Another 4 hours I try to get a ride without any success. So I grab my backpack and walk into town. Even on the 5 km to the city centre no one stops to do me a favour. As I pass the city border a big sign says "Welcome to Moose Jaw, the friendly city". Great, I think and hike on. At the Greyhound station I buy a ticket to Calgary and about 10 minutes later (I had to jog with my 40 kg backpack for the last kilometer in order to catch the bus) I am on my way. Even though I didn't do the whole distance, 5000 km of hitch hiking in 5 days aren't a bad result at all. No matter what, it is still the best way to discover land and people instead of just rushing by in a car.

One hour later the weather has improved dramatically. The landscape is really green, but still flat.

Few houses stand close (so that one can see them) to the highway, there are more elevators for grain storage. The further west I come the smaller the settlements get, later the afternoon there is almost anything left....

And then there is nothing anymore...

People here joke about that when a dog runs away the next day the owner just gets out and calls him back :-))

During the long tour I talk a lot with people on the bus, an interesting mix as there are PJ (from Holland), Iff (from Montreal, who got to Moose Jaw by bike and is only having a break until she reaches the Rocky Mountains) and Steve (maybe 16, on his way to father and sister in Vancouver. Around 10:30pm I arrive in Calgary and walk for an hour in order to see that I am at the wrong address (normally it is really easy with all those perpendicular roads, but sometimes they just end somewhere and begin again elsewhere, aaarrrggghhh!). I take the bus to get to the right street and I am lucky again. The bus driver is really nice and asks me, where about I am from and where to I am going. He is telling me, that he is active member of a kick box club and that he was in Wiesbaden the previous summer ;-)) The ticket is free again and then I already have to change the bus. 1am I meet Kate and Dave (friends of Rob), who warmly invite me to stay in their house for the next days.

July 12th, 2001

Today I sleep in and have a big breakfast. Early afternoon I take the train to Stampede Park, which houses the world's biggest rodeo event. Beside a gigantic amusement park there is a Indian village, where traditional dances are performed in a contest. Here I meet Iff again, who joined the omnipresent turmoil and enjoys the atmosphere - it's a small world ;-))

Furthermore the is an agricultural show (cattle, pigs, alpacas, horses) and of course the actual rodeo! The whole city is in stampede fever: store windows are decorated, hay stacks dominate downtown, cowboys and ladies walk through the streets and sing and shout...

In the evening - after a delicious supper - I get back to Dave and Kate. I am tired and so I hit the sac right away.

July 13th, 2001

For today I only planned for a stroll around downtown and time just flies by. When I get back to Kate and Dave this early evening I see Peter, Simon, Sabine and Vroni again. They just arrived and so we are having a spontaneous beer and BBQ party in the frontyard. He have lots to talk about and so we chat deep into the night.

July 14th, 2001

Dave and Kate show us their favourite breakfast place, an Irish pub called "Kilkenny". Here we have a rich breakfast for $1.99. Later on we enter the stampede again, this time including a visit at the rodeo show that I missed two days before.

Rodeo is set up in different disciplines, one more suicidal than the other. Somehow we get onto the most expensive seats from where we have a great view on the arena. We watch the contests of barrel racing, horse riding and bull riding. It's really exciting to see how people try to keep their balance.

In the evening we sit in the frontyard again having a beer or two, only Peter and Vroni have to pack their stuff. Around 11pm we drop off Peter at the Greyhound station, from where he leaves for the west. Vroni is next, we drop her off at the airport from where she is flying back home to Germany. Until we can pick up Daniel we have about 20 hours and we hear that distant call of the mountains. So Simon, Sabine and I drive into the night and set up our camp about 40 km away from Waterton at a farmers field.

July 15th, 2001

5:30am we get up as the sun dips the remote Rockies into a golden light.

Half an hour later we are in Waterton, another 3 hours until a ferry brings us across Waterton lake in Waterton National Park. Here we hike on a trail that is described as Canada's most beautiful trail. You have to be careful with those superlatives, but still it is a very nice tour, a little too crowded maybe.

Most of my pictures of this hike where sabotaged by my own camera, maybe later there might be more.

The trail runs through 8 km of a stunning landscape, with waterfalls and school book examples for students of geology. Almost at the end we cross the tree line and have to crawl through a narrow tunnel in order to climb up the last meters to Crypt lake. A marmot rests on the trail and stays there even when I approach it. I take some real good close-ups, but as mentioned before.....(aarrgghh!).

At the clear lake we have our lunch break and one after another the other people from the ferry arrive. As we make our way back still more hikers arrive who have taken their time. We take the 4pm ferry back and make it in time to Calgary airport where we pick up Daniel, who is going to travel with us for the next three weeks. The last evening in Calgary we spend again in Kates and Daves frontyard, enjoying a cool beer in a warm summer night.