Head Smashed in Buffalo jump
Trip Start
Jun 20, 2008
1
15
16
Trip End
Aug 08, 2008
Calgary,
Alberta,
Canada
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
Today didn't go to badly to start with even though I thought we were leaving at 8am so I was up and ready by about 7:30am only to then learn from Jeff the Giant that we were not actually leaving until 9am so I got on with doing some of the journal entries.
When we got on the road we headed out of the city to a smaller community called Okotok which in Canadian Indian means place of "The Big Rock" as this is the location for The Big Rock which was actually deposited by a Glacier many millia ago, but then the Indian history as to why it is there is much more appealing.
"THE ROCK THAT RAN"
One hot summer day, Napi - The supernatural trickster of the blackfoot" sat upon the Rock to rest. Because it was so hot Napi threw his robe over the rock saying "Here I give you my robe, because you are poor and have let me rest of you. Keep it always".
Napi walked on and it to rain. Napi sent to the rock and asked it to lend him the robe, but the Rock refused. Napi got angry and took "HIS" robe.
As he walked away he heard a aloud noise, the Rock was chasing him!
Napi was scared and ran. His friends the buffalo, the deer and the antelop tried to stop the Rock but were crushed. Nearly exhausted Napi called upon some bats for help.
The bats dove at the rock and one hit it in the middle and split it in two
And the most ironic thing about the Rock is that it is actually from the region of mountains around Jasper, so this Rock weighing more than 16,500 tons is more than 500km away from the Canadian Rockies from which is originated and it is lying in the vast plans of the Albera prairies.
We got to the location of the Head Smashed In Buffalo Jump and they actually had a dancing display going on which was involving some members of the Blackfoot Tribe which originated from around the Calgery Plains area. The dancing and native costumes were absolutely breathtaking, there are photos I took but words just can;'t describe the experience of being there when they were performing.
A museum has been built next to the actual location of the Buffalo Jump and it explains about the whole process and a movie was made with a reinactment which really put it into perspective which made the experience that little bit more special.
I will leave it there as being in a place like the Buffalo Jump is an experience that words just can not do justice for, but believe me when I say that if there is a place in the Top10 List of places to see before you die, this is definitely in that list.
