Dinosaurs of Alberta
This road trip will highlight key dinosaur sites in Alberta, starting in the South and heading North.
The first stop is Warner at a little-known museum, but one with great reviews. Located inside the county building at 300A County Rd, Warner, AB T0K 2L0 (phone +1 403-642-2118), the Devil’s Coulee Dinosaur and Heritage Museum has a collection of dinosaur bones and eggs. Visitors report having field tours to a dig site a short drive from the museum and highly recommend it. Seasonal hours may apply, so it is best to call ahead. The nearby Milk River and Writing-on-Stone Provincial Park are also great places for tubing, canoeing, camping, and seeing the naturally carved-out landscape. Who knows, maybe you will even find your own fossils.
Dinosaur Provincial Park is two hours North of Warner and 90 minutes south of Drumheller. It hosts interactive exhibits, camping, wildlife viewing, canoeing, and camping. With 4.8 stars on 2300 Google Reviews, it continues to be a popular location. Please note that collecting and removing fossils from the park is prohibited. Seasonal hours apply, but updated information can be found here: https://albertaparks.ca/parks/south/dinosaur-pp/
Travelling North to Drumheller, the Badlands Historical Centre (335 1st Street East, Drumheller, AB phone +1-403-823-2593) is the original dinosaur museum in the town. The museum highlights the area’s history from the dinosaur age through indigenous populations to modern coal mining. The historical center is open seasonally and has limited volunteers and staff, so it is best to call ahead.
The biggest dinosaur museum in the country and one of the leading dinosaur museums in the world is also located in Drumheller. The Royal Tyrrell Museum hosts many exhibits, activities, speakers, and experiences for all ages. It is open six days a week (closed Mondays) and has extended hours from 15 May to 31 August. Trails around the museum are present and pets can be walked there, but only certified service animals are allowed in the museum. The interpretive path from the museum is free of charge and does a 1.4 km loop. It also has off-site experiences, including Devil’s Coulee (3 hours south), where a local teen discovered a dinosaur nesting ground in 1987.
The Royal Alberta Museum, located in downtown Edmonton, is not explicitly dedicated to dinosaurs but has fossil collections on display. The museum has a wide variety of displays in case not everyone is sold on dinosaurs. For visitor information, see: https://royalalbertamuseum.ca/.
Much farther North in Wembley, the Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum (https://dinomuseum.ca/), named after famed Canadian paleontologist and founding member of the Royal Tyrell Museum Professor Dr. Philip J. Currie, hosts various exhibits and labs for people of all ages. Seasonal hours may apply, so it is best to call ahead to confirm hours and opening days (phone +1-587-771-0662, visitorservices@dinomuseum.ca). The address is: Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum 9301 112 Avenue Wembley, Alberta, Canada T0H 3S0, which is five hours Northwest of Edmonton near Grand Prairie.
For local events en route, see www.gozeeit.com.
