Category: Exploring History

There’s this charming little ghost town out there on the Alberta Plains that like the mythical Scottish Village of Brigadoon springs to life, not once every hundred years, but one Saturday per month*. The people they come for “Pizza Night” and to partake in the ambience, all those amazing old...

Given the sheer number of forgotten and abandoned places we get to visit (and we so love being that busy), it’s inevitable we cross paths with ones we’ve documented before. Quite honestly it’s sometimes hard to return as often the building or site is rarely as it was – for...

Presenting a most fantastic find, an old house and outbuildings, long abandoned, lonely and isolated, sitting there in a field with nothing else speaking of human habitation to be seen in any direction. And take in those stunning Alberta Badlands as a backdrop…a more picturesque setting could not be imagined....

Moyie is a charming little town in the East Kootenays of British Columbia. Tied to mining for its first few decades – the St Eugene was a huge producer of lead and zinc, silver and gold – today it’s a sleepy little community with a retirement vibe, split by a...

We’re in Brant Alberta to take in this prairie skyscraper, taller than anything around, standing in a sleepy little burg down by the tracks and where there were others it’s now the last one. With some good timing, those amazing colours and that “mood” one can only get as the...

There’s quite a contrast here. On one side there’s an ancient grain elevator, all old and weather beaten but still solid and unmoving, standing where built over a century ago. And on the other there’s a modern railway with a singular function, the moving of goods. Watch the freights run...

If you find yourself out near Brooks Alberta, turn south on Highway #36 just west of town and head on down to a little community called Scandia. They’ve got an extra special prairie-life themed open air museum there that you can take in. A vintage grain elevator and old train...

Our little group of history nuts has visited the Hanna Alberta Roundhouse many times over the years. In the past it stood there abandoned with an uncertain future and we fully expected when next we returned it’d be gone. Fast forward to today and the building (since late 2013), is...

How about some bridges? Train bridges that is…it’s been a while. Here’s a pair, not all that far apart, both easily approached from public property, both about a century old, and both belonging to the same railway, although when built each was along a competing line. Take in these impressive...

The Team revisits a most interesting place, one we’ve been meaning to return to for some time now. Here, punched into the side of a solid mass of limestone at the base of a towering mountain, deep in Kananaskis, a most curious installation. Presenting, the Bunker dating to those crazy...

We can’t help it. We’re crazy in love with small town museums. They are the most wonderful of places, repositories of local history, quaint and full of charm, allowing one to step back in time and connect with what used to be. Simply wander about taking in the exhibits, examine,...

It’s after dark one mid-winter’s evening, no snow and plenty warm. If that’s not a good excuse to get out with the camera and shoot, I don’t what is. So here we are, at a place we’ve been meaning to photograph for some time, Sunalta School. Located in the Calgary...

Here’s a few out of the way places we documented last fall in the far eastern reaches of Alberta. We’re hanging with a good friend, and cruising the back roads, not really caring what we find since it’s more about the socializing than it is the subject matter. Still, we...

Buildings like it were everywhere in rural districts across the province in the first half of the twentieth century – there were thousands of them! A person need only travel a short distance back then, down some random backroad, to see one. Where there was a group of farms, one...

The late 1950s/early 1960s era was witness to some interesting architecture, in particular for commercial and business use. Sure there was the plain old shoe box design philosophy that’s always been there and dominated the scene, square and unimaginative, and cheap to build. But for those who dreamed it got...

Standing on the very edge of the Alberta Badlands, peer down and be awestruck on seeing the scenic valley below. There’s the car way over there by the river. Hello, we just came from there. All that layered strata. Next spin around and it’s endless fields of golden grain waving...

The road in is rough, more a cart track than anything. Bouncing along for many kilometres there’s nothing as far as the eye can see. Then come to the edge and look down. Way down. Drop into a valley, the track steep, narrow and precipitous. It’s something very logging road...

What you see in this post has changed since we documented it last fall. The subject, an old house sealed up for decades, has been cleared of possessions which have been put in safe storage. Next any issues with the building will be tackled, with eventual plans that everything be...

The Team has documented our fair share of churches, every last one of them special and beautiful to us in their own unique way. As subjects go, they’re one of our most favourite and we get giddy photographing and writing about them. The one seen today, even among all the...

When was the last time you saw an independent computer shop? Bet it’s been a while. There used to be lots of them, busy places all, with seemingly one on every corner, but mostly they’ve gone the way of the dinosaur. It’s one tough racket and even the big chains...

The past four or five years now a group of friends get together and explore. This merry band whose domain is dusty backroads, spend some summer weekend in some corner of Alberta (sometimes venturing into Saskatchewan too) in search of abandoned and forgotten stuff. Lots of cool things are seen...

It’s a lonely forgotten place, this rural property. The ride in takes one down a long dusty backroad, then a muddy cart track all squishy and rutted up, and finally cross country through pasture and field. Regular cars are unlikely to survive the journey. Arrive, stand and look around. In...

You’ve probably heard us speak of the film Forgotten Prairie. A number of posts we’ve published over the last few months have touched on it to one degree or another. Now you’ll get to see it. Finally! A production of Rueben Tschetter’s Cache Project, it’s a fine little piece about...

Each and every day it’s within view of tens of thousands of passing motorists but I bet a lot of them pay it no mind. There, along side road set back a bit from the #1A, but easily seen from it, and a mere stone’s thrown from Calgary’s City Limits...

Where Highway Ten crosses the Red Deer, at a place called Cambria, turn and glance north for a second. Over there, upstream, not far away and super easy to see, giant hunks of concrete sitting there in the middle of the river. Strange monoliths these, the remains of two bridges,...

God, the weather was awful. The bone chilling cold, howling wind, freezing rain and driven snow, a miserable weekend in the making. Or so we thought. It’s April 2017 and we’re out exploring back roads of Alberta and Saskatchewan with a rag-tag group of friends, in these horrible conditions, taking...

This here fine spring day finds us in Mossleigh Alberta, a pint-sized town just a bit southeast of Calgary. There’s all kinds of railway themed stuff here and old grain elevators – this is what we’ve come for. Today, we’re here to act as a guide for a train buff...

Perhaps a year or so back Team BIGDoer was approached by Rueben Tschetter, a well respected film producer and videographer with Cache Productions, Red Deer Alberta. Seems he’d been watching some of what we were up to – exploring abandoned places and ghost towns and chronicling the experience – and...