Early this morning I headed out west of Okotoks, Alberta to photograph the "Big Rock" in the sunrise.  This is a very large erratic - which means that it is a piece of rock that broke off the top of the Rocky Mountains in the last Ice Age, about 18,000 years ago, and was carried by the glacier out onto what is not the prairie/foothills.  As the glaciers melted, the rock was deposited where it is now. There are many of these all over the prairies.

This particular one apparently came from the summit of Mount Edith Cavell, which was above the glaciers, near Jasper Alberta, a distance of about 350 km as the crow flies. It is pure quartzite, as is Mount Edith Cavell.

It was quite cold, minus 13C, with a breeze and I had fun other than freezing my fingers.  They are tender as I type this.

For those of you who live in western Canada, Big Rock Beer, a great brew IMO, is named after this.

In this and the following, you can see the main ranges of the Rockies in the background.

This is a detail that I converted to Black and White

Garth