Southern Alberta

Introducing Southern Alberta

While the tourist hotspots of Banff, Calgary, Edmonton and Jasper grab many of the headlines in Alberta, the largely forgotten south is a hidden gem. Rolling farmland gives way to landscapes that look to be from another world. Towering hoodoos, the funky arid sculptures that look like sand-colored Seussian realizations, dominate the horizon. History abounds in both the recent Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump and the not so recent Dinosaur Provincial Park, two areas preserving the past and attaining Unesco World Heritage status.

Natural wonders are plentiful in this sleepy corner of the province. The dusty dry badlands open up into wide open prairies to the east, which stretch all the way to the Cyprus Hills of western Saskatchewan. To the west there is Waterton Lakes National Park with some of the most spectacular scenery in the Rockies – yet still under the radar of most visitors.

It’s a rough and rugged landmass down in the south, where cowboys, Indians, buffalo and maybe even the odd dinosaur still roam. The only thing missing are the tourists – and that’s just fine.

Last updated: Mar 2, 2009