Royal Tyrrell Museum: Dinosaur heaven in the Alberta Badlands

For a lot of people, their first obsession when they were kids was dinosaurs, and for a lot of them that obsession just never went away.

When it comes to taking a deep dive into dinosaurs, few places compare to the Royal Tyrrell Museum near Drumheller, Alberta. It boasts one of the finest collections of fossils on display in the world as well as being situated in the middle of a unique landscape.

Drumheller in the Badlands

The town of Drumheller rests firmly in the Alberta Badlands. While it’s technically in the Red Deer River valley, the region is colloquially referred to as Dinosaur Valley for obvious reason. This region has proven to possess one of the richest deposits of dinosaur fossils on the planet.

While the town itself has a few attractions, a big part of what draws people to the area is the landscape. The Badlands are a series of narrow, winding valleys and gullies that occur in patches across the Western Canadian Prairies.

The terrain is punctuated by incredible hoodoo rocks formations, generally tall and slim spires of rock emanating from the Badlands. To call them dramatic is an understatement. The entire presence of the Alberta Badlands gives the feeling of standing in the middle of history.

Glancing around allows even the most neophyte geologist to see layers of Earth going back millennia after millennia in some cases. Various areas like Horseshoe Canyon and Horse Thief Canyon are great places to experience the stark, terse beauty of the region.

Driving into Drumheller is an experience on its own. Leaving the glowing fields of canola waving in the breeze behind, the drive suddenly dips down into the valley. Visitors are immediately transported to another time and place in a matter of seconds.

Dinosaur Provincial Park

The original proposed home for the Royal Tyrell Museum was Dinosaur Provincial Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site not that far from its final location. While the museum might not be there, it’s importance to paleontology cannot be understated. It’s also just a fun place to go.

One of the most striking aspects of the park is it’s incredibly complex and beautiful ecosystems, which includes the Badlands. It’s filled with diverse plant life such as some of the most northern species of cacti. On top of that, there are multiple species of birds, mammals and reptiles.

But most people come to Dinosaur Provincial Park for, well, the dinosaurs. This park contains one of most well preserved and diverse range of fossils in the world. Prime examples of what the park houses can be found in the Visitor Centre.

Prior to the opening of the Royal Tyrrell Museum, most of the fossils found in Dinosaur Provincial Park were sent away from Alberta for study. But that changed once the museum was founded and opened, keeping an important scientific resource in the region it came from.

Royal Tyrrell Museum of Paleontology

The main attraction in the area is the Royal Tyrrell Museum. Situated in Midland Provincial Park, the massive facility operates as both a public museum and a research operation. There is still a lot more history to uncover in the Badlands, and the Royal Tyrrell Museum is at the forefront of it.

It officially opened its doors in September 1985 as the Tyrrell Museum of Paleontology. Five years later, the name was updated after Queen Elizabeth II bestowed the title of “royal” upon it. Since then, it’s gone through two major expansions, the most recent of which was completed in 2019.

The public portion of Royal Tyrrell Museum is home to 13 exhibits with over 800 fossils on display which have been organized by their geological era. But the private collection contains more than 160,000 fossils, most of which are used for research purposes.

What makes the museum stand out is its scope. The experience of walking through it cannot be fully encapsulated in words. Their meticulously curated collection is housed in one of the top facilities of its kind. Its a space that takes a full day to take in at a minimum.

For dinosaur enthusiasts, the Royal Tyrrell Museum is an absolute must. But so are Dinosaur Provincial Park and the Alberta Badlands in general. The fun of the museum and the beauty of the  region means visitors don’t have to be a dinosaur fanatic to appreciate it all. But it doesn’t hurt.