Wood Buffalo National Park

On the Mackenzie Highway (AS Hwy 35; NT Hwy 1) through northern Alberta and the adjoining Northwest Territories to Enterprise. Thereafter NT Hwy 2 to Hay River and from there NT Hwy 5 south through the National Park to Forth Smith, from where the center of the huge conservation area can be reached.With a total area of about 45,000 sq. km (17,370 sq. mi.) Wood Buffalo National Park to the south of Great Slave Lake is the biggest national parks in Canada. Two-thirds of the Park lie in the province of Alberta, one-third in the Northwest Territories. The Slave River marks the eastern boundary of the Park.Now listed as a World Heritage Site this vast conservation area extends across one of the world's largest inland deltas (the Athabasca-Peace River Delta), an immense wilderness of dried-out salt plains and wild landscape, dotted with lakes and swamps and traversed by rivers, the habitat of numerous now rare species of wildlife.The Park was established in 1922 with the purpose of saving from extinction the last free-roaming herds of wood buffalo. Today more than 3000 of these animals graze the Park, together with moose, black bear, cariboo, beaver and a great variety of smaller mammals.Every year whooping cranes arrive from Texas to breed and rear their young. Wood Buffalo National Park is one of the last, if not the very last, refuge for this extremely rare species of crane, now in desperate need of protection.White pelicans breed beside the Slave River rapids, feeding from the Park's many lakes. The steep river banks afford good views of the nesting grounds.Huge flocks of migratory birds visit the Athabasca-Peace River Delta on their annual pilgrimage south.