Noteworthy: So much to see across the west

By Bruce Penton on August 6, 2025.

Recent travels across Western Canada and observing fellow travellers in action on the Trans-Canada Highway makes me wonder about tourist attractions along the way.

For instance, how many people driving through Medicine Hat stop at the giant Saamis Tepee to read about the background and get a picture?

Alberta seems to have more ‘giant’ tourist attractions than any other province. There’s the giant dinosaur in Drumheller, the huge painted egg in Vegreville, the spaceship in Vulcan and the UFO landing strip in St. Paul. Then, of course, there are the giant nature-produced mountains outside Canmore.

One can’t miss the gigantic moose as you drive through Moose Jaw. The prize for the least inspiring visitor attraction? It has to be the giant potato outside the Canadian Potato Museum in O’Leary, PEI. That baby would make a truckload of hashbrowns, but is there anything more bland than a simple potato?

• Do you believe in magic? You don’t have to believe in it to enjoy it, and there’s a cool guy putting on a pair of shows today at the Medicine Hat Library theatre.

Christopher Cool of Calgary is putting on shows at 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. and if last year’s great performances are an indication of what’s to come today, local fans of magic are guaranteed to be in for a treat.

You know what else is magic? Any admission charges to the Cool shows have – poof! – completely disappeared. In other words … it’s free!

• A couple of current and retired (me) newspaper people were sitting around the other day talking about artificial intelligence and how it may shape our world. We’re not sure if the shape would ultimately be positive or negative, but the AI technology will undoubtedly affect us in a number of ways.

One of the people (a Winnipeg sportswriter) said the ChatGPT app does miraculous things in the blink or two of an eye and challenged me to try it out. I happen to have the app on my phone, so I opened it, typed in “Write 500 words on the Florida Panthers winning the Stanley Cup” and waited no more than five seconds for 500 words in well-fashioned, colourful, accurate prose to fill up my phone.

I swear on a stack of Tiger Woods’ scorecards that I would never resort to using ChatGPT to help fill this column, but I can see where some journalists in the world, pressed for time and under the gun from their editor to produce – and quickly – a few stories for that day’s publication, might use the technology. Is it really plagiarism if the original writer is … well, nobody?

• Casey Van Maarion did some great renovation work in my Medicine Hat kitchen a few years ago, and if he’s as good at running festivals as he was reshaping my home, his inaugural Grain to Glory festival on Aug. 16 should be a hit.

Van Maarion bought the old Ogilvie Flour Mill and plans to undertake a major construction project that will turn the old mill into apartments and commercial enterprises.

To kick off his plans, the Aug. 16 festival at the flour mill site will feature live music, food trucks, local vendors and a number of games, including a $10,000 hole-in-one competition. That last one should excite anyone who owns a set of golf clubs. Later in a day, a beer garden will open, with fun and music featuring a number of local bands running until 2 a.m.

Information about Van Maarion’s development plans will be available at the festival, which he hopes will become an annual affair to celebrate the anniversary of the purchase of the old flour mill by his company, 12Twenty2.

• Short snappers: It’s good to see Canadians following through on earlier threats to vacation in Canada instead of the U.S. Hotel occupancy rates show increases in Canada and decreases in the U.S. from last year at the same time. . . . In a span of 36 years, the No. 1 book assigned to students in Grades 6-12 in the U.S. was unchanged – Romeo and Juliet. It was No. 1 in 1989 and it’s No. 1 today. No. 2 books were Macbeth in 1989; the Great Gatsby in 2025. … Got a couple of hours to kill? The 207-page report written by the Alberta government on the Medicine Hat Municipal Inspection can be found on the city’s website and makes for some interesting reading. It should be required reading for anyone running for a seat on city council this October. … Canada has a new tennis superstar. She’s 18-year-old Victoria Mboko of Toronto, who sidelined American Coco Gauff, ranked No. 2 in the world, at the Canadian national open last weekend. … Our country being one of six to airdrop food and other supplies into Gaza makes me proud to be a Canadian.

Bruce Penton is a retired News editor who may be reached at brucepenton2003@yahoo.ca

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