We tried really hard to get going by 8:30 this morning but didn't make it -- we move too slowly. We drove up a provincial road as apposed to the interstate to arrive at Rocky Mountain House National Historic Site which is north of Calgary and west of Red Deer.
This location was chosen by the Hudson Bay Company and the North West Company as a good place to set us trade posts. Both companys were in competition with each other to trade with the aboriginal groups for furs and other skins. They each built forts or houses. NWC tried 3 times to keep a fort in operations and HBC built one. They both arrived in the area in 1799 and by 1875 they had both moved on.
It was a hard life and the Indians weren't real cooperative. The Blackfoot prevented the trappers from crossing the Rocky Mountains to trade with the Kootenai Indians on the west side because they didn't want them to have guns with which to wage war with other Indian tribes. Of course, winters were harsh and summers unproductive because not much trapping happened then. Travel to and from the forts with the trade goods was even worse. Most traveled up and down the rivers -- the HBC used flat-bottomed York boats and the NWC used birch bark canoes. They even tried horse or oxen drawn wagons.
One good thing came out of these camps and that was the mapping of Alberta's Rocky Mountian area. Cartographer David Thompson used Rocky Mountain House as a base camp for exploring the mountains, he being the first European to cross Hauser Pass.
After lunch we drove to Wetaskiwin where we camped in a Lion's Club campground.
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