Sunshine Mountain

Sunshine Mountain! Catch the cable car up high, above the tree-line and follow the trails over the great mountains!

Rafting the Bow River

Inkpots

'The Inkpots'

The Banff National Park is full of treasures. We only had a few days in the area, and merely scratched the surface of a place which could have occupied us for a whole holiday. Johnston Canyon, is one of the most accessible of its attractions, with a busy car-park and an obvious trail, leading upstream away from the magnificent Bow River, through the Canyon and up into wilder territory.

The rule of thumb seems to be that for every mile you walk way from the car park, the number of people you meet halves. The walk to the lower falls was busy, to the upper falls steady, but the track up to the Inkpots wonderfully lonely, with the continual excitement provided by the recent bear sightings in the area.

A nice family picnic spot beyond the Inkpots,  vast mountains, huge forests, wild rivers.

The Inkpots themselves are a nice little geological feature which stains the pools different shades of blue and green.

Canmore Town

One of the best places to go if you want to buy your very own Gurgle Pot!

Canmore Miners Reunion

Back in the summer we spent an eventful week in the attractive town of Canmore, which lies just outside the Banff National Park. It seems that while building and planning regulations are very strict within the parks, there is a lot more scope for all kinds of development once outside their boundaries. 

For the majority of its existence, Canmore was a mining town. Locals were keen to tell us that the mines were the reason Canmore existed, and around which life was based there, for over a century. Following closure of the mines in the 1980s, the town then fell into disrepair, and has only latterly been rejuvenated through tourism, winter sports and some nice spin-offs from the Winter Olympics.

Every year however, the town comes out in force to remember its mining heritage. The annual miners reunion brings ex-miners, their friends and families back to Canmore for a day of celebration marked by parades and festivities.

A lot of Canadians trace their roots back to Scotland, something that was apparent here in the music, and on the placards. The families of the miners all displayed their family names as they marched, which included plenty of  'Mc' and 'Mac' names as well as other Scottish names such as Wardrop. Later immigrants brought swathes of Polish and other Eastern European names to Canmore.

Reformation 500

The Christian and Secular media are both noting the fact that it is five hundred years since Martin Luther nailed up his 95 thesis against the sale of indulgences; which became a seminal moment in what ultimately became The Reformation. As well as talking about it a bit in a church on Sunday morning, I've been listening to a brilliant online lecture series by Dr Carl Trueman about all things Reformation. It's informative, alarming, sometimes funny, and Trueman turns about to be rather generous to his opponents; perhaps more so in person than in print! If you want to know what Luther was "the Jimi Hendrix of The Reformation", or why Zwingli was "The Doors of The Reformation", then look no further! The entire series is found here: https://faculty.wts.edu/lectures/lecture-01-the-reformation-with-dr-carl-trueman/  He doesn't even mention Led Zeppelin until the third lecture, which for Trueman is quite good going. 

In Johnston Canyon

At Lake Minnewanka

At The Canadian Badlands Passion Play

The Alberta town of Drumheller, is famous for three things; Dinosaurs, Star Trek, and The Canadian Badlands Passion Play. It was the last of these three things which drew us to that unusual little town this summer. 

The play is a dramatic and musical presentation of the life of Jesus, as portrayed in the Biblical gospels; set in an enormous outdoor amphitheatre. The vast set is divided into different areas, each representing the different settings of the well-known stories around 1st Century Palestine under Roman occupation. Bethlehem, Galilee, Nazareth, Herod's palace, The Temple, Pilate's quarters, and of course Calvary are all there. The hills behind the set are also brought into use, as angels appear and disappear. Portraying Herod in such comic terms was a surprising twist, and when Herod lapsed into Trump-speak, it was genuinely hilarious!

We were there on the opening night of the 2017 season. The actors looked very nervous as they began, and hesitated their way through a couple of opening scenes. Then as they reached the 'sermon the mount' scene, everything came together and the whole thing suddenly took off. It was at that point that I became unaware of the folks in the seats around me and was drawn right into the story. 

I should add that all these photos were taken before and after the performance and I did respect their "no-photography during the play" policy.

It was wonderful to see the gospel story given such a compelling and vivid dramatisation. The trial and crucifixion of Jesus was very moving, and extremely well done; the horror and violence of the event somewhat downplayed beneath its sheer significance; gripping for adults without unnecessarily disturbing the children. (No Mel Gibson direction!). The resurrection was in contrast somewhat understated.

Weirdly, all three cars in which our group drove to Drumheller from Rosebud had failures on our remote control keys, and couldn't open our car doors. A local wryly told me that there are strange radiation patterns around there, because all the aliens who land in Canada are stored in a secret military base just outside the town. It seems a but rough to lock them up, I assume they just want to visit the Star Trek museum....