Edmonton - The City of Champions

-Edmonton has the longest stretch of urban parkland in Canada, which is 22 times larger than New York's Central Park.

-The Great Divide Waterfall on the High Level Bridge was created to commemorate Alberta's 75th anniversary. This man-made waterfall is 7.3 meters (24 feet) higher than Niagara Falls.

-There are over 70 golf courses in Metro Edmonton including Victoria Golf Course, the oldest Municipal Golf Course in Canada (1907).

-The marigold flower, selected as an official city symbol in 1964, represents sunny Alberta and Edmonton's role in the Klondike Gold Rush. Like the marigold, which has many varieties, Edmonton's population is made up of more than 50 ethnic groups.

-Visitors are assured of plenty of sun and beautiful blue Alberta skies during their visit, regardless of the season. The city averages 12.32 hours daily of sunshine, more than any other major Canadian city. At the height of summer, there are up to 17 hours of sunlight each day.

Quick Tips:

Alberta is the richest of three Prairie Provinces (the list includes also Saskatchewan and Manitoba). "Prairie" comes from the French word meaning "meadow".

Best Way To Get Around:

Edmonton International Airport serves 3,8 million passengers annually; all major North American air lines are here to help you (when the weather permits). You can check your flight (and get other relevant information) at the Edmonton Airports bilingual site: click here.

Provincial Museum of Alberta offers a fine introduction to the human and natural history of the province. This modern building contains four galleries, each devoted to a different aspect of Alberta’s natural and cultural heritage. A highlight, the Aboriginal Peoples Gallery, features all aspects of the lives of the original inhabitants of the western plains. You can visit the Provincial Museum of Alberta online. Click here

The Northern Alberta Jubilee Auditorium is a major venue for theater, ballet, and concerts, and is home fort the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra, the Edmonton Opera, and the Alberta Ballet Company.

Local history will tell you that to the south if the river lies an area that was once the town of Strathcona, which joined with Edmonton in 1912. In the Old Strathcona Historic Area, many of the buildings predate the union and have been restored. The visitors enjoy strolling these charming Victorian streets.

Fort Edmonton Park, Canada’s largest open-air history park, is a recreation on the city’s early history. There’s an evocative reconstruction of the original Hudson’s Bay Company trading post of 1846, and of Jasper Avenue as it looked in 1885, 1905, and 1920.

The Alberta Legislature, home of the provincial government, is a dignified building of yellow sandstone, fronted with a columned portico and capped with a stately dome. Built between 1907 and 1912, it occupies the site of the original Fort Edmonton, overlooking the river and surrounded with fountains, pools, formal gardens and lawns.

No other city in the world has a shopping mall to rival the gargantuan West Edmonton Mall. Some 9 million visitors a year come out here. What they find is a city within a city, built at a cost of over $1 billion.

In addition to over 800 stores, 100 restaurants, 19 cinemas, and 11 department stores, the complex houses Fantasy Land - the world ‘s largest indoor amusement park; an 18-hole golf course; a chapel; a bingo hall; caged animals and performing dolphins, the world’s largest indoor lake with and underwater aquarium (sharks included)… and 4 working submarines - they say, that’s more than the Canadian Navy owns. West Edmonton Mall has also a full sized replica of Santa Maria, the Columbus’ ship.

Our favorite attraction in the West Edmonton Mall was huge World Waterpark. In 1996 we bought a family pass which gave us unlimited access to the Fantasy Land and Waterpark for 4 months ($165). In the Water Park, you can enjoy a magnificent collection of indoor swimming pools, watereslides and wavepools.

Edmonton is the City of Champions. World-class sporting events are nothing new to Edmonton, which played host to the 1978 Commonwealth Games, the 1983 World University Games, 1996 Firefighter Games, 1996 World Figure Skating Championships, the 1984 and 1987 Grey Cup games, the 1999 Labatt Brier and the 2001 IAAF World Championships. Edmonton`s storied sports history dates back to its earliest days. In 1913 John Hougan shattered the Canadian ski jump record with a leap of 19 feet off Connor`s Hill. In 1948 the Edmonton Flyers brought the city its first major hockey title, winning the Allan Cup as national senior champions. Four years later the Edmonton Waterloo Mercurys were crowned Olympic hockey champions in Oslo, Norway, and in 1954 the Edmonton Eskimos won the first of three straight Grey Cups in the Canadian Football League. The Eskimos built another dynasty between 1978-82, winning the Grey Cup every season. Major league hockey arrived in Edmonton in 1972 when the Alberta Oilers became charter members in the World Hockey Association (WHA).

The team was re-christened `Edmonton` Oilers the following season, and in 1978 the club purchased teenage superstar Wayne Gretzky from the Indianapolis Racers. Led by Gretzky, the Oilers won four Stanley Cup championships between 1984 and 1988, then again in 1990 ­ two years after Gretzky was traded to the Los Angeles Kings. The decade of the 90s saw more sporting glory for Edmonton, with the Trappers winning back-to-back Pacific Coast League baseball championships in 1996 and 1997 and bobsleigher Pierre Leuders bringing home Olympic gold from Nagano, Japan, in 1998. Edmonton is the first North American city to host the IAAF World Championships In Athletics. Over 3,000 athletes, coaches and officials called Edmonton home for 10 days in August 2001, while the drama of the third largest sporting event in the world, behind the World Cup of Soccer and the Summer Olympics, was played out. Organizers estimated that four billion people watched the 10-day event.