Just Like Easter

"If I wasn’t an animal expert, I would have been running around chasing for dinosaur bones,” said a giddy Jack Hanna, who’d adopted the personality of a school boy at Christmas. “I have been to some of the world’s most impressive Valley’s, but never anything like this. Every where you go within 15 feet are more fossils.”Hanna’s right, the Dinosaur Provincial Park is so chocked full, it's one of only 11 Unesco world Heritage Sites in Canada.(5 of which are inAlberta, and the crew visited three).

Found just outside of Brooks Alberta, in the Province's south east corner, we took the day to explore the park and uncover some ancient history.

It’s known all over the world by dino hunters- this Provincial landscape, similar to a mini grand canyons with its hoodoo enhanced architecture, for playing host to the highest concentration of dino bone’s on the planet. Suzi and Jack were out on the hunt with Brad Tucker of the Parks’ Service playing host and ensuring they not get turned around. “It’s very easy to get turned around in the park, so we have some public hikes, but others are with a guide for the day.”

Or you can come out and dig with an team hard at work in the blazing sun. DinosaurProvincialPark is very foreign environment. Desert like conditions meet dino hunters every summer, which bring on some slithering friends. There are four types of snakes which call the park home, including the prairie rattlers, the bow snake and two types of gardner snakes,” explained Tucker.

I remember last year I was on a trip to Writing on Stone- another stellar park in the area. We were en route out of the park when we encountered a rattler on the side of the road- I couldn't believe that our province had snakes this big - what we caught was over 12 feet long. Adam Sutherland is a researcher out of the U of Calgary who is studying the behaviours of snakes and their propensity to road ways. It’s hottest in the summer along the pavement and snakes want to bake in the sun.

When you are there don’t forget to hit up the Patricia Hotel in neighboring Patricia on the way into the park. Even better pitch a tent and find a way into the Patricia Pit, the bar in the basement of the hotel where your served meat on a plate where you can grill it on your own.