Saskatchewan Traveller Written By: Dale Buxton


We continue our trip home from Calgary and travelling east on highway 9
We have just left the village of Youngstown and the next community we travel through is the community of Chinook, with a population of around 35 people.
Chinook was named after the warm dry westerly winds of the Rocky Mountains.
Alberta certainly has its share of the mountain chinooks or as they are referred to as “snow eater” when the dry warm air comes off the mountain and melts the snow away in a short period of time.
It doesn’t exactly say but someone in this community back in the early 1900’s must have witnessed a few of these winds and thought the name of the community should be Chinook.
Not much left in Chinook as like most small communities, the population decreases to the larger urban centres.
Next up is the community of Cereal, named after all the crops that has surrounded the village.
Mainly an agriculture community Cereal still has a population of around 100 people.
There isn’t many services left in Cereal as your have to make your way into Oyen the largest closer centre.
One interesting fact about Cereal is that it is home to Marlene Streit , who was born in Cereal in 1934.
Marlene Streit moved to Ontario early in her life and learned to play golf.
She would become the most successful Canadian amateur female golfer and the only female golfer in history to win the Australian, British, Canadian and U.S. Women’s Amateur Championship. She won the Canadian Amateur’s only 11 times in her career and was voted Canadian female athlete of the year 5 times.
Marlene Streit was made an officer of the Order of Canada for her contributions in the sport and an ambassador for Canada, not bad for a girl born in rural Alberta.
Next up is the community of Oyen.
Oyen has a population of around 900 people and was named after Andrew Oyen who was an early settler that sold his homestead for the townsite. Oyen is the service centre for a large area that surrounds the town and is mainly made up wheat and barley with some ranching mixed in.
One interesting notable from Oyen was Melody Davidson, who was the head coach of the gold medal winning teams in women’s hockey at the 2006 and 2010 Winter Olympics and the director of the gold medal winning team in 2014.
The early settlers were of Norwegian descent of which those descendants still live in the area.
Oyen has a lot to offer in recreation with camping nearby and a fishing pond.
Oyen’s favourite pastime in the winter is hockey and curling.
Traveling the number 9 highway seems to be long but adventurous and continuing east we make our way back to Alsask and into Saskatchewan and home.
The Calgary trip was very good and we took some off beat highways to get to our destinations, but it is also nice to be home and plan our next adventures.
Stay tune as we go on another adventure of the Saskatchewan Traveller..


Share These Thoughts

September 12, 2024

Continuing our trip to Medicine Hat we turn left on Alberta highway 41 south. An interesting fact that right on . . .

September 12, 2024

We continue on our trip to Medicine Hat. What a nice visit in Leader, its always a favourite place to . . .

September 12, 2024

On a beautiful day in July we pack the bike for an adventure southbound, this time destination is Medicine Hat, . . .