I stopped for lunch at Canmore and picked up a proper map of Alberta. I left the main highway at that point and took the less traveled 1A. I was leaving the Rockies for the foothills of Alberta.

My one regret with the Rockies was not seeing any big horn sheep. I had expected to see some yesterday on the Bow Valley Parkway. As I left the Rockies, I had given up all hope of seeing them. Suddenly, there they were on the side of the road! There must have been 10 or 20 of them. I stopped to take pictures and I was surprised by how relaxed they were about the whole picture-taking-thing. An excellent conclusion to the Rocky Mountain leg of my trip!

There were some large rolling hills that grew smaller and smaller as the day progressed. The landscape was a nice change from the mountains I had spent almost the last two weeks in. The weather was incredibly hot and sticky. There were stops in Exshaw and at Ghost Lake for ice cream, pop, and water. I was craving sugar and fluids, but little else. The heat was making me queasy. I spotted several hawks (red-tailed?) and hundreds of prairie dogs along the roadside.

I pulled into Cochrane around suppertime. The town is named after a rancher from the east who decided to set up a huge ranch in the area. The ranch ultimately failed due to the harsh weather and landscape. There is a huge statue of Cochrane on a horse on a hill overlooking the town. It was erected when the rancher was designated a "Man of Vision" by Alberta. I remarked to the Visitor Center staff that Cochrane couldn't have had that much vision, since his ranch was a miserable failure. They explained that he was still in the east when the problems occurred and there were problems communicating back and forth. Also, no one listened to the ranch hands that were hired from Montana.

In other words, no one was listening to corporate headquarters, the experienced employees were being ignored, and middle management had screwed up again.

I had a decent supper at "The Blue Dog Café" and pitched tent at the municipal campground. Nothing special, but at least it wasn't located next to railroad tracks.

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