Cars, trains, and softball in Airdrie, Alberta
Day 36 of the trip – Sunday, May 29th – was a wonderful day full of family activities in Airdrie. For Cathy and I, this day, like every day, started off with lots of play time with Bella and Tucker in the leash-free park, then we made the 1/2-hour commute to Airdrie, a very rapidly-growing community just north of Calgary.
We had arranged to meet Andrea and the girls at a Show ‘n’ Shine at the girls’ high school, W. H. Coxford. I had no idea what to expect, but the quality and variety of cars was excellent. Those are 1932 and 1935 Chevrolets in this photo.
The buffalo above the license plate on this 1940 Ford was an annual pass to the National Parks in 1940.
The heart of this 1988 Tiffany is a 1988 Cougar, to which fiberglass front and rear clips were added. About 500 were built between 1984 and 1989 – only 2 are known in Canada.
The school’s culinary class did a great job of handling food for the event – the cheese burgers, for $4.50, were very good.
The quality of the work on some of the cars like this one, was exceptional.
I’d seen photos of early Ford Speedsters (this is a 1929), but had never seen one in person. Now that would be as fun project! The owner of this one is happy to drive it with just a mechanical restoration.
Some head-turners stayed out on the road rather than being part of the show, like this race-ready 1968 Camaro, complete with narrowed rear end and wheelie bars.
Detail on a 1969 Roadrunner.
Bella and Tucker were great in the crowd for almost an hour and a half, but then they were ready for some play!
Our next stop was at the Airdrie & Nose Creek Railway at Iron Horse Park. With rides on little 1/8 scale trains for only $3 each, this was a lot of fun.
The city leases the land for the 1.6 km of track, and volunteers handle everything, from building the trains, track, trestles, buildings, etc, to selling tickets and working as engineers and conductors.
Some of the trains like this one can handle a substantial passenger load, up to about 40 people.
This little steam train may not have as much tractive power, but sure looks like fun to work on and operate
The amount of detail on some of the equipment is wonderful.
It takes about 20 minutes to go around the 1.6-km line, but another 1 km of track is almost complete.
After dinner, our final event of the day was going to granddaughter Kylie’s softball pitching practise. A pitching coach had been brought in, and seemed to make a big difference in a short time.
The Prairies are great for storm-watching, and we’ve been getting lots of them, especially in the afternoons. Trees and mountains are great, but they sure block the views! 🙂
The girls wanted to take Bella and Tucker to another leash-free park before Cathy and I went back to Cochrane, and we ended up at this one (Airdrie has several). I wasn’t dressed for the cold rain and wind that arrived, though, so watched from the car, and with no other dogs there, it was a pretty short stay.
Alberta has been quite productive for adding good personalized license plates to my collection – PLMRHMR on this plumber’s Hummer is pretty clever 🙂
Our original plan, and campground reservation, called for us to leave Cochrane on Monday, but a combination of weather and a request from Kylie to attend a softball game caused us to add another day, and it turned out to be a very good idea.
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