Some of my faithful readers will recall that in 2015 I went on an epic summer of rail touring all across Canada, covering both the Halifax-Montreal route and the Toronto-Vancouver route.
(You can read about it here: The Great Canadian Epic, Part 1 and 6 following posts)
At the end of that summer, my thought was that it would be interesting to cross the country by train in the winter, and see how different everything looked. This week, I've done just that. I didn't go all the way to the East Coast, but I again took the 4-night, 3-day ride on The Canadian from Toronto to Vancouver. And it certainly was different!
(You can read about it here: The Great Canadian Epic, Part 1 and 6 following posts)
At the end of that summer, my thought was that it would be interesting to cross the country by train in the winter, and see how different everything looked. This week, I've done just that. I didn't go all the way to the East Coast, but I again took the 4-night, 3-day ride on The Canadian from Toronto to Vancouver. And it certainly was different!
First and foremost, the differences in the train itself. In summer it was a massive consist of no less than 25 cars, with five different scenic dome cars spliced in at intervals. That included two dining cars, several coaches, and a whole parade of sleeper cars. This week, the scale was much more modest: just 10 cars with only one coach, two dome cars, five sleepers (one of them not in use), and a single baggage car.
With the smaller train came a smaller number of passengers. However, they formed just as fascinating a cross-section of society as before. The one really noticeable difference was this: never before in all my train journeys have I seen so many single travellers. Usually, I'm it -- or pretty close.
The amount of Canada you actually see from the train in winter is much less than in summer just because of the much shorter daylight hours, especially on the most northerly stretch of the line in the Prairies.
Another thing that does change is the entertainment -- every time I've travelled, a different group of performers. At regular intervals throughout the trip, a piano and guitar-vocal duo called The Audio Rays entertained us with 30-40 minute concerts in one of the lounges. They gave a great mix of well-known standards, lesser-known but intriguing songs, and original compositions of their own. Their style ranged across jazz, blues, light rock, and folk. Their last set, after dark on the final night, included a first-time performance of a song developed during an impromptu song-writing workshop the previous evening, which was really impressive considering the short notice! What set the seal on their work, for me, was their deeply moving performance of Cohen's Hallelujah which concluded that final concert.
With the smaller train came a smaller number of passengers. However, they formed just as fascinating a cross-section of society as before. The one really noticeable difference was this: never before in all my train journeys have I seen so many single travellers. Usually, I'm it -- or pretty close.
The amount of Canada you actually see from the train in winter is much less than in summer just because of the much shorter daylight hours, especially on the most northerly stretch of the line in the Prairies.
Another thing that does change is the entertainment -- every time I've travelled, a different group of performers. At regular intervals throughout the trip, a piano and guitar-vocal duo called The Audio Rays entertained us with 30-40 minute concerts in one of the lounges. They gave a great mix of well-known standards, lesser-known but intriguing songs, and original compositions of their own. Their style ranged across jazz, blues, light rock, and folk. Their last set, after dark on the final night, included a first-time performance of a song developed during an impromptu song-writing workshop the previous evening, which was really impressive considering the short notice! What set the seal on their work, for me, was their deeply moving performance of Cohen's Hallelujah which concluded that final concert.
And then, predictably, there's the winter weather. The shocker here was that after 3:00 pm on the first full day we got nothing but sunshine, all the way from Hornepayne in Northern Ontario clear through to Vancouver.
Unlike my previous trip, we fell three hours behind time by Edmonton and stayed that way right to the bitter end. The result was that we missed the mountains west of Jasper altogether but travelled through a fair chunk of the Fraser River Canyon in twilight the next morning. It was astounding. I've travelled the Canyon several times by road, but the highway is so much farther up the sides of the gorge that you don't get more than the odd passing glimpse of the spectacle. I feel that I never truly experienced the Fraser Canyon before this trip.
Sadly, the VIA train normally transits the Canyon in the dark. Only the tour trains of the Rocky Mountaineer routinely travel through the Canyon in daylight. Well, I'm glad I got to see as much as I did of that awe-inspiring place.
One technical note: I made a serious boo-boo when I decided to make do with my phone instead of carrying my more bulky SLR camera along. In the dim light of a cloudy winter Ontario day, or a pre-dawn transit of the Fraser Canyon, the pictures turned blue despite my best efforts to correct them. Please be patient with me!
With that, I'll stop writing and just let my pictures and brief captions speak for themselves.
The train circling Gogama Lake in Northern Ontario:
Arriving in Hornepayne, Ontario, in a snowstorm, and then the change in the weather less than half an hour later (and still in Hornepayne):
A stand of trees in a clear sky west of Hornepayne:
A clear but very wind-blown morning of flying snow in Winnipeg:
The prairies aren't all flat -- shown here in Manitoba:
A sculpture of rails and wind drifts by Mother Nature in Rivers, Manitoba:
The spectacular view of the Assiniboine River valley in Saskatchewan:
A prairie sunrise east of Edmonton:
Mountain views on the approach to Jasper:
The main street of Jasper, the train station, and surrounding mountains:
Early on the last morning, some views of the Fraser River Canyon and surrounding mountains:
Unlike my previous trip, we fell three hours behind time by Edmonton and stayed that way right to the bitter end. The result was that we missed the mountains west of Jasper altogether but travelled through a fair chunk of the Fraser River Canyon in twilight the next morning. It was astounding. I've travelled the Canyon several times by road, but the highway is so much farther up the sides of the gorge that you don't get more than the odd passing glimpse of the spectacle. I feel that I never truly experienced the Fraser Canyon before this trip.
Sadly, the VIA train normally transits the Canyon in the dark. Only the tour trains of the Rocky Mountaineer routinely travel through the Canyon in daylight. Well, I'm glad I got to see as much as I did of that awe-inspiring place.
One technical note: I made a serious boo-boo when I decided to make do with my phone instead of carrying my more bulky SLR camera along. In the dim light of a cloudy winter Ontario day, or a pre-dawn transit of the Fraser Canyon, the pictures turned blue despite my best efforts to correct them. Please be patient with me!
With that, I'll stop writing and just let my pictures and brief captions speak for themselves.
The train circling Gogama Lake in Northern Ontario:
Arriving in Hornepayne, Ontario, in a snowstorm, and then the change in the weather less than half an hour later (and still in Hornepayne):
A stand of trees in a clear sky west of Hornepayne:
A clear but very wind-blown morning of flying snow in Winnipeg:
The prairies aren't all flat -- shown here in Manitoba:
A sculpture of rails and wind drifts by Mother Nature in Rivers, Manitoba:
The spectacular view of the Assiniboine River valley in Saskatchewan:
A prairie sunrise east of Edmonton:
Mountain views on the approach to Jasper:
The main street of Jasper, the train station, and surrounding mountains:
Early on the last morning, some views of the Fraser River Canyon and surrounding mountains:
