Old Prairies Homestead

Living on the Alberta Prairies means there's plenty of old homesteads just falling down. I can't even count how many decrepit buildings I see on my drive to work every day. I love it! I wish I could just drive into them all and take photos!

Just south of me is a great little homestead in a coulee. What sets this one apart in my  mind is the fact that is has a BRICK house. I don't remember ever having seen an old brick house on these sites. They're usually the same type of wood as the barns and outbuildings and have gained that nice silvery colour with their age. I really like that silvery colour but man does this brick look great in the right setting! That right setting just happened to be when I was cruising the country side with pails full of chicken guts in the back of my car.

I didn't want to dump these on my acreage because that would lure coyotes in and they have yet to discover the yummy poultry living here and I want to keep it that way! So off I drove down the road to find a suitable ditch on a lesser traveled road that would keep the 'yote's away for the immediate future. My direction of travel, south. The time of day, just before a great big honkin' hail storm! On the way back I couldn't not look at the homestead and think "Aggghhh WHERE'S MY CAMERA?!" So I went home and got it! The house looked amazing in front of all the clouds!

I also took a stroll over to take photos of the barn. It was attached to some out buildings that looked great too. Unfortunately they had powerlines attached which just didn't suit the photos at all! So with some picky composition you get the barn sans the outbuildings! This photo session was pretty quick considering the storm coming in. There were even tornado warnings linked to this one as well as the severe winds and hail so I was pretty much running through the tall grass trying to find good spots for photos! Of course... in my rush I ended up losing my cell phone so once I did a quick search of the house, barn and car for places I may have lost it, back I drove to the homestead to retrace my steps in the grass for my phone. Luckily the place is really close to home and luckily I found my phone! I don't think it would've survived the weather that day.

Here's the barn and the scene of the cell phone misplacement.

Enjoy!