Maps for Geocaching in the Moose Jaw Wild Animal Park Provincial Recreation Area

When people think of outdoor activities, they don’t always think of geocaching, and they often don’t think of Moose Jaw.

History

Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan is approximately 60 kilometres west of the provincial capital, Regina, and is home to 35,000.  It was founded in 1903 and sits on a few historically important trade routes. The fur traders used the Moose Jaw River to capture beavers, and later, the rum runners would use it to bring alcohol up from the United States during prohibition.  One theory on the rum runners is that Al Capone himself was up in Moose Jaw, hiding out and overseeing part of his empire. If there was any evidence of Capone being in Moose Jaw, it seems to be lost.

The Park

South of Moose Jaw is the Canadian Forces Base Moose Jaw, or Bushell Park. This is where the Snowbirds train, and have a large airshow most years. In between the city and the air base used to be the Moose Jaw Wild Animal Park. It ran out of money in the 1980s, and while the government helped them out for eight years, it wasn’t enough and the park eventually closed in September of 1994.  The land was vacant for quite some time, with only a buffalo herd wandering around their pastures.  Eventually the buffalo left, and the place was deserted for over a decade. The province took it over, and turned it in to the Moose Jaw Wild Animal Park Provincial Recreation Area.  The cages for the animals have been long removed and sold. The brick buildings that housed the administration and the bathrooms have been vandalized and abandoned.  Most of the pavement has been overgrown. You can still see where some of the animals would have been kept, and many people in and around Moose Jaw still remember what was where and how loud the lions were.

The Geography and the Geocaches

The Moose Jaw Wild Animal Park Provincial Recreation Area is a fairly quiet, peaceful place, and the local geocachers have definitely found it. Geocaching is a bit of a bizarre sport or hobby.  Someone else hides something, usually a small plastic container, often in the woods, and you’re told, by a webpage, where to go and sometimes, how to get it.  To get out to the general area, you will spend part of your time looking at your GPS and/or paper map;  the rest of your time will be poking in tree stumps, likely looking holes and overturning rocks.  It is a great way to get outside for an easy or difficult walk, and discover new places.  Walking around the park is fairly easy, as most of it is quite flat. There is a small but somewhat steep hill that leads to where the buffalo used to roam, and is now home to a large population of prairie dogs.

You can find all of these geocaches without climbing the hill, but one does warn that you do have some scrambling ahead of you.  These four geocaches are traditionals. This means that you simply find the box at the location indicated, there is no puzzle to solve or a tag that redirects you anywhere. They are all considered small, so they could vary in size from a inch long to 6 inches long. They are placed approximately where the symbols have them, but you should go to geocaching.com if you are interested in knowing more.

Terrain Map of the Moose Jaw Wild Animal Park Provincial Recreation Area (Moose Jaw River Valley)

Create your own Topographic Maps of the Moose Jaw River Valley and its parks. Simply search for Moose Jaw, or other nearby feature with the search function in the upper left corner of the map making application.  From there, you can navigate to the specific area you are interested in.

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