At the end of June, in lieu of a birthday gift, Mack and I took the opportunity to spend the day together and explore some area attractions that we hadn’t made the time for yet.

To start, we headed to Fort Saskatchewan for their highest profile restaurant – The Downtown Diner. Having been featured not only in the Journal, but also in Food Network’s You Gotta Eat Here, Keith and Lori’s brand of comfort food has attracted some devout fans, many who are willing to make the drive from Edmonton for a meal.

Because of that, we were expecting a bit more of a line, but hey, no complaints here. It also probably helped that we missed the frenzy caused by the television episode by about a week. The diner itself is fairly non-descript on the outside, located along one of the main drags in downtown Fort Saskatchewan. Inside, the L-shaped restaurant is lined with cushy red vinyl booths and checkered floors, and looks exactly how you’d imagine a diner to be.

The Downtown Diner

The staff also play their part – they were genuinely welcoming and friendly, with Keith making a point to thank every table for their business.

The menu is full of diner classics including burgers, fried chicken and mac ‘n’ cheese. Our seat by the kitchen actually made ordering very difficult – everything coming off the counter looked amazing. I settled on the diner hash with some meat ($14), while Mack was swayed by the special, a fried chicken and waffle sandwich ($14).

He definitely won this round: the fried chicken was spot on, crispy and tender, sandwiched by layers of waffles and cream cheese.

Fried chicken and waffle sandwich

My hash would have been enough to feed the two of us, made up of potatoes, scrambled eggs, turkey (an add in), and topped with gravy and hollandaise. In hindsight, fried eggs would have been the better choice, but it was still a satisfying dish. Both of us agreed we’d be back soon to take on the later day entrees.

Diner hash with turkey

The staff at The Downtown Diner are definitely proud of their restaurant – it shows in the food and the service, and you won’t regret the trek out to see for yourself.

After brunch, we headed on foot to a nearby park to see the other attraction in Fort Saskatchewan that we’ve heard a lot about: the sheep.

If you didn’t know, Fort Saskatchewan started utilizing sheep as their living lawnmowers in 1992. From June to September, a flock of about fifty sheep can be seen grazing at various parks four days a week. And yes, this novelty draws its share of tourists, to the point where they have a “sheep hotline”.

We found them!

On that scorcher of a day, the sheep weren’t too difficult to find, clustered under the only available shade cast by a grove of trees. Although the website proclaimed how friendly they were, they did seem pretty wary of us.

With Fort Saskatchewan’s mascots

Along the way, we also stumbled upon the Fort Heritage District. It is a much smaller facility than our own Fort Edmonton, but they had an exciting lesson of axe throwing underway. We were invited to watch the students, but needless to say, we were asked to stand way back.

Axe throwing at the Fort

We hopped back in the car and continued north to Gibbons for Jurassic Forest. With the release of the popular Jurassic World sequel this year, Mack was hoping for more formal staycation tie-ins with Jurassic Forest, but we only just realized that in some ways, the attraction is old hat – we were both surprised to hear that it opened back in 2010.

Since then, Jurassic Forest has undergone a number of upgrades, and have increased the animatronic figures from 42 to 51, and have enhanced their educational displays. We didn’t really know what to expect, but we hoped to be intrigued.

T-Rex

The dinosaurs were split between two heavily shaded trails (something we were thankful for on that day). We initially liked the idea of “stumbling upon” the creatures as we turned the corner, unknowingly tripping a motion sensor, causing the figures to come to life.

Edmontonsaurus, on the right

But in some ways, we were disappointed that the dinosaurs had such limited movement (opening of eyes, raising of arms, and flicking of tails).

Stegasaurus, one of my childhood favourites

Mack was also anticipating that we’d be able to get closer to the animatronic displays. The novelty of seeing them in the distance like wildlife quickly go old, and some of the figures were hard to see in the bush.

In the distance

While we appreciated the placards describing each dinosaur, there were also some randomly placed placards about the flora and fauna, which may not have actually coincided with their location. We understand the facility was trying to encourage learning about our own native species still present, but they seemed like an afterthought.

T-rex selfie!

Since we were there anyway, we extended our stay with a round of mini golf. It was probably a mistake to remain out in the full sun for any longer than we had to, but it was a fun side activity.

Journey to Extinction mini-golf

The Telus World of Science now has a similar animatronic exhibit called Dinosaurs Unearthed, so you may not have to travel as far to see these prehistoric creatures come to life. But it is at a smaller scale, and doesn’t have the built-in appeal of the outdoors. And while I’m not sure I’d recommend Jurassic Forest for very young or older children, it was still a site to experience.

Looking forward to our next adventure close to home!