Day 9 (Aug 7) – Drive to Edmonton

First of all, I only took 1 picture today and I didn't have the memory stick in the camera when I did.
Our destination today is the West Edmonton Mall, which is a destination in itself :) 

We got up, had breakfast in the room, got packed and left Calgary.

I drove until we hit Red Deer.... maybe I should re-phrase that, I drove until the town of Red Deer.

(no animals were hurt in the travels of this family. Bugs are a different story, don't get us started on keeping the windshield clean)

Lunch was fun. We ate at Eastside Mario's. We used to have one near our house about a decade ago. Its a fun Little Italy themed restaurant. And apparently they still exist in Canada. Yeah for us :)

It was also really kid friendly which is great since not all our dining options have been.

Then after a quick water run and gas refill, we are off once again to Edmonton.

The sky today was fairly overcast, which we really haven't seen since we left home.

Once we found our way through all the road construction.....

We got checked in and found our room. The hotel is right inside the mall and has funny themed rooms. Ours isn't a theme room, but we do have bunk beds. It all has kind of a cheesy Vegas feel, with lots of mirrors and lights, loud carpet etc. But the room itself is pretty mellow.... and its good to have a quite place to go. The West Edmonton Mall is massive. Two floors, at least 3 phases (not sure what that means), a waterpark, themepark, aquarium, movie theater, two mini golf couses, bowling, a full size ice skating rink (we are in Canada after all), and then there is shopping. Ahhhhh!

So it's a bit crazy out there.

We walked the mall to get our bearings, although I am not sure I know where things are yet. And then got tickets to the assorted attractions. The kids really wanted rides, so we hit Galaxyland for a handful of rides before they closed. Being Sunday most things close early in the Mall (which was kind of a blessing) so we needed to move quick to find food before they all closed up shop for the night.

After dinner we enjoyed a round of mini golf, and our youngest said the best part of her day was getting a hole in one. She was sooo excited.

Then back to the room to get ready for bed and wind down.... not in that order.

I hope to take pictures tomorrow :)