Ye haw, it's show time!

...Stampede time that is! After missing every festival in every Latin American village/town/city we travelled through, low and behold if we don't make it to Calgary for the start of the Stampede. For once our timing is immpecible.

Now that's a cowgirl!

Luckily for us, Mike had met a Canadian in Baha California very briefly and fortunately we were able to crash at his place for a few days. Chris donned his cowboy boots and hat and we were off. First we made it to the last 20 minutes of the parade (It started early and after 8 months on the road, who were we to start getting going before 10am!) but that was enough of the cowboy hats and boots and learning how to yell Ye Haw! rather than Ya Hoo! Next a bit of sight seeing - Calgary is actually quite a big place. Of course Chris is also into bikes (he has 4 of them) so we inevitably visit a few bike shops to stock up on some parts and winter kit for our journey north, mainly getting some new winter gloves to replace the ones I lost in Bolivia.

Morning number two brings with it a cheap breakfast at the Legion's Club (A Canadian version of the RSL). So stack up the pancakes and get ya dancing shoes on, and it was only 1oam. Mundane chores such as much needed haircuts and beauty salon visits get me ready for Sunday's entertainment - the rodeo (I'm still learning to call it a rodeo rather than a rodeo as in Rodeo Drive, LA)

Mike isn't drawn into the whole Cowboy attire, but Chris, being a kind of local gets right into it.

Heck, it wouldn't be a stampede without the horses. We enter the show grounds looking way out of place for our lack of cowboy attire. There are the few side show alley games to be tried and fortunately, no one wins the large teddy bear - how would we zip tie one of those to the bike!


Then for over two hours we are entertained by horses and stedes trying their darndest to get whatever it is on their backs off. The most entertaining part of this was the look on the guys faces just before being let lose out of the pen, the camera zooms right into the grimmace of the cowboy that says 'What the hell am I doing here!' And of course the Aussie guy won his event.

This cowboy actually screaming, 'Somebody get me off of this thing, ooh, ouch, ouch!'

Next it was onto something a little less demanding, pigeon racing and line dancing. And then day wouldn't be complete without riding a torpedeo and finishing off with a few ales with some of Chris's mates. It was hard to leave the stampede but when I started to eye off a pair of pink cowboy boots, I knew it was time to get moving again.