Calgary and Trail
Alberta and British Columbia
A busy street in Trail, British Columbia, with Cominco, the largest zinc works in the world, just visible in the background
26th June - 1st July 1999
Saturday saw us on our travels again, this time flying from Toronto to Calgary. We were originally going to go by land, but the distances in Canada are so vast that it would have taken us several days of bus travel to get to British Columbia, and we had to be in Trail before Canada Day (July 1st), when my friend Katy Pearson was going on holiday. Also, we got a very good deal on cheap flights from Toronto thanks to Travel Cuts, Canada's leading discount travel agency - they ended up being cheaper than a bus trip.
The flight from Toronto to Calgary was uneventful, although we did go through a fairly rough patch of turbulence along the way. We caught the airport shuttle bus to downtown Calgary, and the driver was kind enough to take us for a brief tour of Calgary en route to the Greyhound bus station, showing us a beautiful park with a large lake.
Devonian Gardens, downtown Calgary
Despite being a fairly large town (ca. 800,000), Calgary was surprisingly quiet for a Saturday night, although admittedly it was a fairly dreich evening. After stopping for something to eat, we decided to visit the Devonian Gardens, an extraordinary, beautiful park in downtown Calgary, located on the fourth floor of a shopping mall. In 2.5 acres, it has some 20,000 plants with 138 varieties, in a carefully landscaped setting surrounded by modern high-rise buildings.
Terrapins and koi carp in the Devonian Gardens
In addition to plants, the gardens also have a small water gardens, where for a small donation you can feed the many koi carp which live in the ponds. It is a very peaceful location, understandably very popular with the locals who visit to have their lunch and take a break from stressful city life. It's open every day from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. and best of all, it's free, although they do encourage donations. They also manage to blend in a variety of interesting sculptures seamlessly into the gardens, making the Devonian Gardens an excellent place to visit if like us you're passing through Calgary.
Koi carp looking for dinner, Devonian Gardens
After having a beer in a friendly bar in the centre of Calgary, we made our way back to the bus station for another overnight bus trip, this time to Trail, British Columbia, to visit Katy Pearson, an Internet friend. The journey was not too bad, as the bus was less than half full, which meant that we all had at least two seats to ourselves and we could stretch out a bit - I even managed to catch some sleep. The highlight for me though came at about 6 in the morning, about an hour out of Salmo, when the bus driver braked suddenly. I looked out the window to see what had happened, fearing an accident, when I saw a huge moose jump over the roadside barrier and career off down the hillside. Seemingly we were very lucky, as close encounters with mooses are fairly uncommon.
Friendly chipmunk at Le Roi gold mine looking for lunch ...
... and having found it
Trail itself is a very pleasant small town with the largest zinc works in the world and two huge hydro-electric dams which provide the power for the factory. We visited the dams, but the water was so much in full spate that my photos came out as a large white blur. However, the next day we visited the Le Roi gold mine, now no longer operating but converted into a museum-cum-tourist attraction. We had an interesting tour underground with Dylan, our well-informed guide, making me feel very glad that I've never been a miner. The mines produced gold which today would be valued at around C$ 2 billion.
The "almost extinct" weather rock
The mine was combined with a local history museum, which had some very interesting exhibits, including the famous weather rock shown above. The caption reads:
"Le Roi Weather Rock. Code - when rock is wet - raining; bright - sunny; white - snowing; icy - cold; swinging - windy; gone - tornado. This weather rock was made possible by the research and development work of Cominco."
An example of Canadian humour!
Also in the museum was a collection of old bottles found in and around Rossland, and one in particular caught my attention, as it had originally contained a bottle of whisky and was blended by a man called Robert Crawford in Trinity, Edinburgh, the district where I am originally from - it is indeed a small world!
(Left to right) Kay Crawford, Fergus Soucek-Smith, Marge Crawford and Isabel Crawford
On Tuesday night Katy, her husband Tommy and Marge Crawford took us for a meal at the Colander, Trail's fine Italian restaurant, where the portions are of typically North American proportions. Afterwards we paid a visit to Marge's mother, Isabel Crawford (nee Stewart). The Crawfords are descended from a Carstairs family from Kilconquhar, and together with a number of other researchers around the world, we are trying to tie all the families together, as I am sure that they are all related somehow. In the photo above, I am holding a picture of Kilconquhar House which the Crawfords inherited (the photo, not the house!). Have a look at my family history page for more info on the Carstairs.