The remaining couple of days in Churchill were very uninspiring, we couldn't get back to the highs of the Polar Bear tundra buggy experience. We had a possible exciting moment, when one evening as we drove down the long track to the Marina to look for Belugas while the wind had subsided, we were parked up and saw a brief white tail disappear behind a rock a few feet from the car. A few seconds later, what looked like a Wolf appeared from behind the rock and casually walked around the car park before moving back up to the road. I say "what looked like" since there are a lot of sled dogs in Churchill that bear more than a passing resemblance to a true wolf, and although we were 15km out of town, the possibility this was just one of them can't be ruled out, I'm not sure we'll ever know.
Driving the same few roads as the previous didn't produce much other than much closer views of an Arctic Hare, again sitting on the lee side of rocks by the road, and unconcerned at us approaching them on foot.
The next couple of days have been far from relaxing and the camera has hardly been used, and have just been spent travelling, firstly the gruelling 14 hour train ride back to Thompson with a 3 hour drive to a town called The Pas straight after. Having had mostly cloudy nights while in Churchill, the night on the train was clear, and we got our best views of the Northern Lights.
On arriving in The Pas, the only accommodation we could find online ahead of arriving in the town was an inn, and even before we set foot in the place we had an uneasy feeling about it. This was made worse by driving round the back of the building to our room, past a group of people that looked like they were doing a drug deal. On top of this, while we were settling into our room, there was a discussion in the hallway outside where someone had called social services on one of the residents, not the most restful of places, especially with a long drive ahead next day. Despite the now late hour, we decided to get the hell out of there and thankfully found a much nicer hotel nearby, though why they aren't on hotel booking sites I'll never know, and we could have saved a lot of stress!!
The next day we drove 1,100km back to Alberta, which took just over 12 hours in total. We took a different route back, but as with the drive eastwards, we still faced mile after mile of incredibly straight road, we measured one at 55km from one bend in the road until the next!
Arriving back around Calgary, we were met by a scene similar to something out of an apocalypse movie, lightning, very strong wind, rain and hail, we honestly thought a tornado was going to develop any second, but we made it to our accommodation near Sundre unscathed.
Next morning, we awoke to a glorious sunny and frosty morning, and the ranch we were staying on was perfect for a short morning walk. The hoped for Great Grey Owls that they have breeding on site sadly didn't appear, but a close encounter with a Moose, plus many American Tree Sparrows, Dark-eyed Juncos, Red-breasted Nuthatches, a Sharp-shinned Hawk and another Harris's Sparrow were seen.
Our final destination for a few days before we head back to the UK is just outside Bragg Creek. When we visited Canada in 2016, Toni found some Wild Horses to photograph near here and so we came in via the Ghost River Valley, but the horses were mostly hiding in the trees and a Golden Eagle was about the only bird of interest to be had, some Bighorn Sheep by the road were much more photogenic though.
Being just outside Banff National Park, we will at least get a day there to look for Elk, wolves and other more exciting wildlife in the next day or two, and hopefully get the chance to reacquaint ourselves with he camera once more.
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