Day 24 - Thursday, October 10

A beautiful day in Medicine Hat, Canada's sunniest city (330 days a year) so it's not just us this time. We were out about 8:30AM to enjoy a self-guided walking tour of historic downtown MH. It totally did not occur to me this trip would be in the heart of rush hour. No worries, this is downtown traffic at its peak.

It truly is a wonderful city with many century old buildings, some re-purposed and some sadly abandoned. The courthouse was fascinating. We entered and asked if we could come in, explained we were just annoying tourists who wanted to have a look. The sheriff waved us through and indicated we could just walk around. Upstairs they let us into the main (the only) court room. It was just before 9AM so no cases were yet being heard. I was asked to remove my hat (you heathen you) then a lawyer asked if we were there to be heard. Admitting once again we were mere tourists she smiled and wished us well. Just imagine doing this in Toronto.  😅

We spent a long time looking for the mural painted in honour of the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women. It was something that seemed important to me even though it was such a sad state of affairs that such a thing even exists. I knew from an online map exactly where it was but we walked under the bridge 3 times, back and forth, and it was not there. We ultimately had a conversation with a group of middle-aged women in a shop near where we had parked and they told us it had been painted over and re-cemented just weeks ago. I found that a little surprising but I have no idea what the protocol for wall space is.

A walk down by the South Saskatchewan River was very pleasant, especially on this cool fall day.

The St. Patrick's Parish on the other side of the river was beautiful. We tried to go in but it was locked. Aren't churches always supposed to be open?

All that's missing from this photo is a train...again the mind boggling morning traffic.

The Saamis Tepee was originally constructed for the Calgary 1988 Winter Olympics. It was moved to MH in 1991 as a tribute to Canada's native heritage. Each of the 10 masts feature a large storyboard and the structure is indeed the world's largest (oh no, here we go again) tepee.

You can walk a distance around the structure to view it from many angles...a very peaceful procedure.

We're leaving tomorrow morning we just don't know where we're going to land - all part of the game.

😎