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What Problems!Sep 9, 2009
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Plains Bison on the road
Astotin Lake
Bison herd
View from shoreline trail
We arrived safely in Edmonton and on the Tuesday morning the coach went into the authorised Spartan repair shop, First Trucks. After they looked at it they informed us that there was nothing wrong with our ride height and there was nothing wrong with the suspension. The only issue was that the back brake pods were touching a structure bar put in by Newmar. They were waiting for Newmar for a response after sending photographs. We got them to do some maintenance work needed on the coach and then returned to the campground.
On the Wednesday morning we took the coach for the wheel alignments and then to have a chip in the windscreen repaired. The good news was the alignment went fine but the chip in the windscreen was too large to be repaired. We would just have to see if it cracked. Only time would tell. While the coach was having its wheel alignment we called in First Truck. Newmar had come back and were authorising the work at their expense to sort the strut bar touching the brake pods.(Good on you Newmar considering the coach is over five years old) So the coach was booked into First Trucks next day.
With our third day of taking the coach to a repair workshop we decided we need a bit of tourism while they worked on the coach. We headed out in the Jeep to the Elk Island National Park east of Edmonton.
The park has a long history. In March 1906 Canada’s first wildlife sanctuary was established in the area called Elk Park. Five local men pledged by bond to the government to protect one of the last remaining herds of elk in Canada on a 41 square kilometre fenced enclosure around Astotin Lake.
Bison was introduced to the park in 1907 really by mistake. 400 plains bison were being shipped by rail to Buffalo National Park at Wainwright from Montana. Forty eight animals eluded capture when they stopped overnight. These 48 flourished and their offspring remain in Elk Island today. The herd offspring over the last century have been sent all over North America to re-establish herds where they once roamed.
In 1957 a small herd of pure wood bison (thought to be extinct) was located in a remote corner of Wood Buffalo National Park. 23 animals were transported to Elk Island for conservation in 1965. They were housed in a separate enclosure.
We drove the main road of the park and enjoyed several great walks in the Astotin Lake area. Bison were around but we didn’t see any elk.
We returned back to Edmonton and picked up the coach and returned back to the campground. We decided we would have a couple of days rest and make sum decisions as to where we would head next now we no longer had any issues with the coach!
