Aviation and Railroad explorations

July 31^st, 2026

Edmonton, Alberta

Woke at 8:00am, but was still feeling dead tired.

Went back to sleep for another hour and then sat in chair for 30 minutes after that, and still felt dead.  Took a shower and that helped, but think this might be a physically exhausting day with all I have planned.

Dressed and went down to the bike and got it ready.

Rode out of the garage and then across downtown, and reached my first stop in about 12 minutes.

The Alberta Aviation Museum.

This site is located on what I believe was an old airfield.  The building was part of a military site from what I could read, and lots of open land still around it, though appears it might be in the process of being developed.

Paid my way in and explored the museum.

They have several planes from the 1920s through the 1970s on display.  Most of them have been nicely restored, but from what I can gather from many of the signs, few if any of these planes are flight worthy, and most will never fly again.

Noorduyn Norseman Mk IV (1942)

The really cool feature of the place is that all the planes are on display in a diorama fashion that places them in a context of how the plane was used.  Many of the planes also have local relevance, or are replicas of planes that were locally used and lost in crashes.

Barkley-Grow T8P-1 (1938)

An equal mix of civilian and military craft, and quite a few planes that served both functions.

Canadair CL-13 Sabre Mk I (1950)

Many of the planes had some access to the inside for the tours, but as I did not take a tour, I did not get to peak inside any.  Most of the tours seemed to be focused on young kids, probably about 20 of them in various groups around the place, guessing some kind of summer program as they even had one area roped off for the kids to be sitting at a table doing something.

The restoration side of the hanger was off limits also without a tour guide, so could not see that stuff.

I did go outside for a few planes they have outside.  A few military planes, similar to ones inside, just not restored.  Another plane that must have belonged to a local company and a private jet that was abandoned at the airport years back and eventually moved here to get it out of the way at the actual airport.

Hawker Siddeley HS.125-600A (1973)

Once done, I got on the bike and head to the next place.

This one was about 25 minutes away, on the far north side of town, actually out of town.

I was hungry, but really did not see anything I wanted to eat along the way, so did not stop anywhere.

Spent bit of time on the highway and then turned off on to a country lane.

Few miles north of town I pulled into the ground of the Alberta Railroad Museum.

Parked in the dirt lot and went into the main building which is an original railway station used in another town on the other side of Edmonton.

Bought my ticket, and decided not to take the ride on the speeder (small rail transport cars used by rail workers to move back and forth on the tracks).

I just went into the main area which is all outdoors.

They have several locomotives and cars of various types parked along tracks.  A few original buildings as well that had been moved from other places to here as well.  Most were closed to the public, used for staff only, but a few were setup like how they would have been at original locations.

General Electric Locomotive C40-8M (1990)

Many of the train cars were accessible to walk through.  Some were still setup as they were originally, or restored to how they were at some point in the car’s history.  Others were empty and used for displays on other railroad history and topics.

There were several dozen cars farther out that were not accessible to even walk around, either extra stuff they just left there or future restoration projects.

They had one locomotive you could get into, the oldest one, a steam engine.  That was pretty cool.

#73, built sometime before 1930, operated till 1960

Lots of extra equipment laying around as well, and even an old water tower you could walk around inside.

The main building also had more items displayed in there.

I enjoyed the walk, but found I was somewhat hindered by having to carry my riding jacket and helmet around.  At the air museum they had offered to hold my helmet at the desk, so only had the jacket, but here they did not have any place.

I really need to research new luggage I can lock, then I could leave the jacket in the pannier, and also need to see if I can find a way to lock helmet to the bike.

While I doubt I would have an issue so far out of town as the only people here were visiting the museum, just never know when sticky fingers will come by.

I had trouble walking in some of the cars because of the gear, and was just dripping sweat as it was well into the 80s and no breeze inside the cars.  And carrying all the heavy gear was a bit of a work out (which might have been a good thing).

I also skipped reading a lot of signs due to this.

When I finished, I got on the bike and headed back to the hotel.

When I arrived, I came up to the room and took a cold shower to cool off and wash the layers of sweat away.

I then sat down to eat a few chips as I was very hungry, and then I fell asleep in the chair for about an hour, I think.  Time is a bit fuzzy here.

Woke enough to realize it was close to 5pm, so decided to walk over and get an early dinner.

I looked around for another place to eat, but those within walking distance were either not open yet (dinner only), already closed (lunch only), not anything I wanted to eat, or too costly.

Thought about a Russian place, but reading the reviews made it seem like the place is mainly a psychic reading place, that just happens to serve food as well, and sounds like it could be a bit annoying.

I decided to just return to the Donair place from the other night as the food was good, reasonable in price and was also the closest place

Walked over, had same sandwich, but this time had a loaded poutine as a side.

Worked on videos while eating.

Returned to the hotel and sorted some of the still damp clothes, moving them where they might dry faster.  Underwear and socks are about 95% dry, so should be good by morning.  Half the shirts are going to be good, but others may still be damp, those are the ones I Moved around to either get better airflow, or sitting on the vent to get either AC or heat on them. (I have thermostat set to 24 C, it keeps running AC, then runs heater, then AC, and so on, weird, but lots of air movement, so maybe will help dry stuff.

Took the time to write the blogs I was behind on as well as todays, and then will get back to the video, hoping to get another one completed before I go to bed tonight.

Might go down later to the lounge and have a drink, try and be social? 

Really need to work on that.  While I have had a few really good local encounters, I generally seem to stay isolated, or spend more time in the room working on media.  Might have to rethink how I manage that on future trips.

Well, that sums up the day, so will get back to the rest of it and leave you till tomorrow.

Todays Route: