Yesterday I SHARED the story of the 10 kilogram solid gold Bill Reid tribute coin with you. Truly a sight to see it's a design that we as Canadians can all be proud of but with a price tag hovering around $650,000 it's not exactly the next purchase for most of us; the irony of following up that post with one about the Occupy Vancouver movement was not lost on me! So I figured we'd also share a story about a collectible coin that every single one of us can own.
We left the house yesterday morning knowing that The Canadian Mint store was going to host us to tell us all about that sweet gold coin but we also were armed with the knowledge that they often offer tradesies at the store. Bring in your old and used quarter or loonie and sometimes you'll get a fancy new one, so I tucked a tarnished loonie in my son Arlo's back pocket and told him to ask them if they had anything he could trade it for once we got there.
After I confirmed that they were in fact doing trades that day, he presented his old loonie to the nice lady at the counter and they made an exchange.
What he got was the 2011 Parks Canada Centennial one-dollar circulation coin celebrating Parks Canada's 100th birthday! It's the first of five new commemorative circulation coins honouring our great outdoors and a century of nature conservation by Parks Canada, and it should start appearing in your change soon. Learn more HERE).
