Back To Vancouver From Moose Jaw & Thankful

A WHIRLWIND trip for a family celebration took me from Vancouver in British Columbia to Moose Jaw in the province of Saskatchewan last weekend.

With much going on during a brief visit I was not able to take my usual abundance of pictures. Luckily, I managed to snap a few shots of a character (Mac the moose) that stands front and center of the rural farming and retirement community that has a population of about 40,000.

The origin of the odd Moose Jaw name is not clear but it is likely due to a river in the area that has a bend shaped like the jaw of a moose. I like better the (believable?) tale that the name is a form of the First Nations word Moosoochapiskun which apparently means “place where the white man mended his cart with the jawbone of the moose”. Even today it would not be unusual to find a moose bone by a road as these handsome creatures do roam the area.

For a small city Moose Jaw is surprisingly associated with big events. During the prohibition era of the 1920s its underground access corridors, created initially by steam engineers, hid liquor to be shipped to Chicago in the US by Al Capone and others who made their fortunes illegally. Who would have guessed that this innocent looking town was part of a bootlegging scheme? In earlier days, Chinese railway workers used the tunnels to escape a disputed “head tax” imposed by the government to discourage Chinese immigration.

Next to Mac the fiberglass moose statue is an aerobatic jet to remind us that Moose Jaw is also home to the famed Snowbird flyers.

The only genuine flyer and wildlife I found was a tiny insect making its way carefully along a rocky road. The ladybug let me take several pictures before lifting off the ground. I envied its ease of travel and natural wings.

During the return flight home I was pleased to see the uneven mountainous regions, typical of BC, come into view after leaving the perfectly squared-off and remarkably open flat fields of Saskatchewan.

Though the ice crystals forming on the window of the airplane I could see more and more waterways tucked neatly into hills and valleys.

I knew we were close to the Vancouver airport when the Alex Fraser Bridge appeared. You can get a closer look at the bridge from my post HERE .

Although I resisted kissing the ground I was thankful that the plane landed safely, thankful to breathe in the West Coast rainforest air, and thankful to have joined a happy family gathering in the Canadian prairies.

To explore more sights from around the globe on this Canadian Thanksgiving holiday, link to Our World at the side bar.

Copyright by Penelope Puddlisms

See more BC scenes at Penelope Puddlisms: BC Life Is A Whale Of A Ride.