We spent this past work week in High River AB. High River is about a 45 minute drive south of Calgary with a nice view of the mountains on a clear day. We stayed at my brother’s new SEED home. Chris only had a two block walk to attend his course as they live only a block from the downtown core.
Like I do whenever we go to a new place, I find similarities to other places we’ve visited or lived. It was no different this week.
The house being right downtown was like our brief stay in an apartment in downtown Grande Prairie. Lots of car and foot traffic noise until about 11pm. An easy walk to a pharmacy or grocery store plus lots of small interesting retail businesses.
The layout of High River reminds me of Trenton Ontario with a river dividing the town. The populations are almost the same. You get that small town feeling when walking around downtown.
I am also reminded of Fort McMurray when I see the berm that has been built after High River had a catastrophic flood in 2013. Fort McMurray has also had to work on flood mitigation after their 2020 flood. High River seems to also have a great number of noisy trucks roaring up and down streets just like Fort Mac.
High River boasts itself as the filming site for the show “Heartland”. Every year, from May to August, streets will get blocked and filming happens right in the heart of downtown. One entire block has fake store fronts used specifically for filming. It reminds me of the fake residential street you see on the tour of Universal Studios in California. Maggie’s diner from “Heartland” is the log cabin looking building.
We got a heavy wet snow later in the week kind of like a snowsquall we would get in Barrie ON where a dumping of snow happened in a short amount of time.
Staying with Russell and Heather for almost a week felt easy. They spent a month at our place in August and Chris lived with them for four months back in 2015. We’ve gotten to know each other’s habits and routines and we get along well. With this visit, in their new home, it was simply making an adjustment to being together in a new place. Even with the small amount of square footage, there was room enough for each of us to find our own space.
I think my brain needs to find similarities when exploring a new area. It brings me a certain level of peace and comfort if I can tie the present to the past.
It was great to have you with us! It’s a blessing to spend extended time with family. We look forward to having you back during the summer months to do some proper exploring.
Thank you, I enjoyed reading this!