STAMPEDE 09

Didnt really know wot to expect from the stampede and was relying on suze to show me around. nadia and flo picked me up at 8am and after a 2hr drive we got to calgary dumped the car and headed on the seatrain to the stampede grounds. first stop was of course the army tents to get my picture taken with some hot men in uniform i was the only one who got my pic taken with them and who played on the tank and torpeodo think they were too embarrassed not me though lol am still a kid at heart! we had a look round the agriculture building next and watched the sheep shearing competiton where a lamb jumped off the stage and made a run for it and the blacksmith competition where they had to make a horsehoe was quite interesting to see! we were all hungry by this point and went for food there was a million and one foodstalls i stuffed my face with footlong hot dogs, crips, coke, corn on the cob, burgers and a million other things that are bad for you! in the afternoon we headed to the nashville north arena where all the big bands play at night and sat and had a few beers, wasnt that exciting there i wanted to get up and dance but no one wld do it with me. on the way to watch the indian village ceremony we stopped and played some of those side show games like bingo, the duck game where u just pick up a duck and will a prize depending wot it says underneath it and the game where u have a water gun and u hot a taregt and the person who makes the water rise fastest wins. i won the 2nd time we played and won myself a purple monkey! was very exciting lol. the opening ceremony wasnt that interesting it was a lot of speeches, first nations people hopping from one foot to the other walking round in a circle. there was a hoop dancer though who was quite good. i did get my picture with some mounties though unfortunately they were old and not that good looking (sorry moy still on a mission to find a good looking one) i did ask them to hold my monkey though they just laughed at me lol. we took a look around the indoor market after that and walked up and down the different stalls kinda reminded me of the things we used to go to at the SECC. i did find a scottish stand where i brought walkers crips but the guy at the till had no idea i was actually scottish. after thatt i found a uk stall where they were selling pg tips, bisto gravy, monster mucnh, quavers, skips, penguin biscuits, marmite and loads of uk chocolate i was in heaven and the best thing was they sold bottles of irn bru so i brought more crisps, irn bru and some millions it made my day lol. after getting some more food we headed to the coca cola stage to wait for the band who were playing at night. it was some band called hinder. we waited an hr and a half for them and they were crap! all the hardcore fans were at the front and we were standing right in the way of the police felt like every 5mins a line of police officers would charge in front of us and take some drunkard out of the crowd. think we lasted about 6 songs then got bored and left. i really wish we had gone to see the show in the grandstand but never mind u cant do everything i guess!

after a good nights sleep we headed back for our 2nd day of stampeding. this time after heading to the stampede to get our rodeo tickets we spent the morning downtown watching the stuff they had going on in the square. there was a band, dog show, indian dancing and lots of people dressed up as various things. best part was when i got my picture taken with some cowboys especially with the ones who let me hold his gun!! we took a walk up stevenson ave after that and had a look at the little stalls most of which were selling the same kinda jewellry. after having some lunch (yet another hotdog) we caught the seatrain back to the stampede grounds to go to the rodeo. it was the best thing about the whole trip. our seats were really far to the side which was a bummer but still good. there was bareback bronco, saddle bronco, bull riding, calf roping and barrel runs. was so good there were few hairy moments where the crowd oooo'd and aaaaaaaaaaaaah'd cause it looked like the cowboys might get trampeled underneath the bull or the horse. no one got hurt in the end though. i was well into clapping and cheering the otehr girls didnt seem to be into it as much but i had fun! after the rodeo it started clouding over and it started thundering and pouring with rain. luckily it was nearing the end of our trip and after grabbing yet more food we headed back to the hotel to grab the car and head back.

was a good 2 days but there was so much i didnt get to do u def need a few more days there to see everything and more money to everything was so expensive! some of it i guess was slightly overrated its kinda like a big theme park but still good and at least now i can say yes i've been to the calgary stampede!!!