June 28, 2024 – Friday
It was a rainy and windy night as we slept behind the Visitors Centre. And it rained most of the day. We stayed in the van at our camping spot until around 10 am when we drove to the Visitor Centre to use their internet for a while.
Later we went to a grocery store to get a few things. Food is probably a little more expensive that home, but not too different. It was funny that there is a mixture of metric and imperial measurements. Liquids were liters (for most items), but weights were pounds. The fruits and vegetables were expensive, but they had cherries on sale, so we bought a few pounds.
Next we drove to the Cardston Temple and parked at the church next door and ate our lunch. It was amazing how crowded the temple was. There were a many patrons and guests. After eating we went to the visitors center and learned about the construction of the temple. The construction started in 1913 and it took 10 years before it was dedicated. Of course, World War I was in that period. The exterior was finished in 8 years, but it took an additional 2 years to complete the interior and furnishings. This was the first LDS temple built outside of the United States.
At 4:30 pm we had an appointment to do baptisms for the dead in the temple. Eva had 20 family names she had prepared over the past few months, mostly her great uncles and aunts. Neither of us had done baptisms for many years, so it was interesting to go through these ordinances again.
After completing the baptisms and confirmations we were talking to a temple worker, and she encouraged us to attend an endowment session. The Cardston temple is one of the few remaining temples where the endowment is presented as progression process. You go from room to room, rather than stay in one room. This is how all the old temples worked before film and video. We didn’t hadn’t scheduled a time, but she said it would be no problem, so we attended the session. It was interesting and different. The rooms were beautiful, with painted murals on the walls. The celestial room was different than other temples we have attended. It had mostly dark wood on the walls and furniture, with a unique woodwork and tapestries. We were glad we went. On the way back to our camping spot, we stopped at A&W for dinner.
June 29, 2024 – Saturday
We camped behind the Visitors Centre again, but the night was quiet and calm with no rain or wind. Later in the morning we visited the Remington Carriage Museum, which was next to our campsite. This museum had hundreds of carriages and wagon from Canada and the US. Many had been restored by Mr. Remington. The museum was very nice, and we are glad we stopped. They are currently restoring several other carriages from other private collectors.
After the museum we continued north out of Cardston. We had planned on driving to a riverside campsite, southwest of Calgary, but it started raining and by the time we arrived near the campsite, the road was a gooey muddy mess. We turned around where the road became really bad with deep muddy trenches and holes. We decided to backtrack into Black Diamond a few miles away and paid for a tent site at the Lion’s Club campground. The rain later stopped, and it was a nice evening at a grassy campsite.
June 30, 2024 – Sunday
We went to church at the Diamond Valley Branch in Turner Valley. It was a church meeting with three things that were uniquely Canadian. First, the opening hymn was “O Canada”, that had been glued into the end of the hymnal. Tomorrow is Canada Day, so they sang the national anthem. Second, the sacrament bread was sourdough bread. I have never had that in church. And finally, there were only two references to hockey from the pulpit. I thought there would be more. It was a nice meeting, and everyone was welcoming to us.
After church we drove north to the Rocky Mountains and camped at the Wapiti Municipal Campground in Canmore. We have a fun adventure planned for tomorrow in Canmore.
Corey & Eva's Travels 