Drumheller: The Royal Tyrell Museum of Paleontology also starring Reptile World

I haven't been to the dinosaur museum in Drumheller since I was 12. I didn't realize then that it had only been open for a year, but my 12-year-old mind always wanted to go back. My dream came true, 25 years later, last week! Lori & I packed up the kids and made the drive south, pretty much directly south, for two hours. On the way there,Chase needed to pee.

 For some of the displays I have the information of their name and species, but I'm not going to post all that here. Not unless you're really interested. And even then, you'll have to ask me nicely, as I took about 200 photos that day...

 Now this was cool. A local school had a contest where elementary students drew pictures that included dinosaurs. I believe this is a grade 1 drawing.

We stopped for a snack halfway through the exhibit. They have a beautiful patio and as it was just before lunch, we beat the rush! 

After lunch we went to Reptile World. The building was ugly and the displays were bare bones, but they did have a LOT of interesting critters from around the world. I learned that reptiles can be beautiful! 

 

World's largest dinosaur at the Drumheller tourist information centre. For $3 you can climb up inside! We did, of course, it took us all of 90 seconds to climb up the iron and fiberglass structure. The kids loved it! 

 

This part of Alberta is called the Badlands.  It is very desert like and, as some of you may know, I *love* the desert. Drumheller has a thriving arts community. This community has really figured out the whole tourist thing - the dinosaur museum only charges $11 for admission. On Vancouver Island, you'd be lucky to pay anything less than $25 for any attraction. It was really a pleasant day on the whole. At the gift shop at the museum, we found dinosaur chopsticks - cheater chopsticks for kids. This was fortuitous, since I had gone to Chinatown in Edmonton a few weeks ago looking for cheater chopsticks but my search bore no fruit. 

I may post a more detailed story of our day, but with my shaky Internet connection, I am lucky to get these 21 photos up.