Vegreville, AB to Grande Prairie, AB


We had an early morning that started with brushing Pepsi and de-fluffing Martin and the van.

As a treat, we went to the nearby Tim Hortons for breakfast and some planning and getting excited about our imminent arrival in the Yukon.

Our first stop was a few kilometres down the highway in Mundare with its large sausage monument honouring the Stawnichy’s Meat Processing plant. SMP has been making sausages in the area since 1959 and we sampled and purchased several different items.

By now it was 10AM, and the Ukrainian Heritage Village a few kilometres down the road was just opening. This reconstruction of what life was like for early Ukrainian settlers includes actual period houses from locations in the area and interpretive staff that interact with you as if you were actually in that time period. This was informative, a lot of fun, and a unique experience. We spent several hours there learning what the life of early Ukrainian settlers was like. We talked to a blacksmith, teachers, and a farmer and his wife.

We saw some chickens, but the star of the farm animals was a very smart pig that used its snout to open and drop the lid of its feed box to rattle the food into its trough.

Time for Ukrainian lunch under a big shady tree followed by a serious stretch of highway to make up our daily quota of kilometres.

Our campground tonight is in Grande Prairie and features what looks like a number of oil and gas workers.

Our restaurant at the campground was right next to a garage where honey was being harvested and we got to sample fresh honey straight from the comb. Yummy!

Guess what? One more Ukrainian meal to finish the day prepared by Irina, who came to Canada from the Ukraine only three years ago.