Hitting the ground running: Trout Creek Canyon, Willow Creek Falls, Calgary, Head Smashed In

Walking the Willow Creek Falls Trail

The early Pasque flowers

Calgary's new Central Library's futuristic design

Calgary's powerful skyline

The Stephen Avenue walking mall in Downtown Calgary 

 We've been back from the UK and Ireland just a week and in that time we've been moving quickly.

We went for a look at the Trout Creek Canyon near York for the kelsea (a failure), a hike to the Willow Creek Falls on the Front (a great success), off to Calgary for a birthday celebration at the opera (failure), a visit to the spectacular library, and a play (both successes) and our first visit to Alberta's Head Smashed In buffalo jump, a UNESCO World Heritage Site (a great success). 

It would be hard to beat Willow Creek.  While it appeared to have a lot of snow, it didn't and we could proceed to the Red Hill, which we ascended several hundred feet.  Along the way we were treated to an early show of alpine wildflowers:  Pasque, Douglasia, Yellowstone Draba, buttercups, and even Glacier lilies.  The Front appears to have scant snowpack this time of year portending potential fire danger this summer.

We failed to find kelsea in bloom at Trout Creek, although it was greening up.  Nonetheless, the trip there is always rewarding with a trail that wends its way through steep limestone walls.

We've so enjoyed our local buffalo jump, the First Peoples Buffalo Jump near Ulm, that we detoured on the way back from Calgary to see the Head Smashed In Buffalo Jump, which is much more developed and highly preserved.  The jump center hikes up four floors of stairs to the top of the site, which draws views of Glacier, Waterton and the Canadian Rockies in the distance.  The walk down through the center is past highly developed exhibits explaining the buffalo jump and the centrality of the bison to the native culture. Our First People's site is the largest buffalo jump in the world, according to Wikipedia.  Why wouldn't it rate a UNESCO World Heritage Site designation as well.  Katie and I thought we'd bring up the topic with local tourism officials.

Covid had erased our regular visits to Calgary these past four years, so it was great to be back.

It was my 76th birthday present and included tickets to the Calgary Opera Company's presentation of Wagner's Ring Cycle prelude:  Das Rheingold.  I had been thrilled by a Chicago Lyric Opera production about 10 years ago.  I wasn't so thrilled this year. What ruined it for me was the set.  The orchestra performed on stage, and much of the action --- the Rhein Maidens, the Niebelungen --- performed in the orchestra pit which was almost impossible to view.  Calgary's Jubilee Auditorium is not a particularly great place for views to begin with.  The costuming was Star Wars knockoff, and digital light backdrops, cartoonish in nature, turned me off.  The orchestra and singers performed well, but I was far too distracted by the set and costuming to enjoy the show.

The trip was redeemed by the next day that included a visit to Calgary's new(2018)  $245 million Central Public Library, a visit to the Mountain Equipment Coop store, and an original Calgary play at Theatre Calgary of the life of American sculptress Selma Burke, which was quite good.  Burke did a sculpture of FDR that was used on the U.S. dime.

At nearly 2 million people, Calgary is growing rapidly.  My first visit was exactly 50 years ago and the population then was 443,000.   That's a growth of almost 5 times!   Driving to our hotel at the airport we were in four to eight lanes of traffic.  The Deerfoot Trail was packed any time of day or night we got on it.  I was totally intimidated.  

Luckily, the city's amenities make up for its congestion.  We enjoyed our time on the walking mall, and a chance to sample many kinds of ethnic foods.  Most impressive is the variety of the city's skyscrapers, and public buildings.  The library was a prime example. The buildings now dwarf the Calgary Tower, which when I first visited, was the tallest building in downtown Calgary.  The city is down right beautiful architecturally.

My intimidation will probably reduce the frequency of my visits in the future.

The Head Smashed In Buffalo Jump center near Fort McLeod, Alberta

At the buffalo jump.  This will have to serve as my 76th birthday official photo

The buffalo jump terrain

A trek to UK, Ireland and London

 

Katie climbing Arthur's Chair in Edinbrough, Scotland

No explanation needed for this London icon

On Hadrian's Wall in England

Stonehenge is a thrilling experience

On Westminster Bridge with Big Ben and the House of Parliament as a backdrop

I guess I would consider this trip to the U.K. and Ireland as a means to fill in some gaps in my education.

It was a must do given my country's history and tight relationship with Britain.

Our first nine days were spent on a Globus tour of England, Wales, Ireland, Scotland and Northern Island.  That left us 6 days to explore London.  Our tour guide, a native of Northern Ireland, was exceptional. 

London is overwhelming, even for this kid brought up in the Chicago suburb of Hammond, IN.  Very, very expensive place to be.

Maybe it's the past 51 years spent in Montana's splendid rural isolation.

I was blown away by number of people stacked in London's gargantuan Georgian and Victorian high-rise apartments.

The traffic is dizzying, particularly around the must-see tourist attractions and museums. At every stop we were occupied by the many many, mostly-free high quality museums.

Thank goodness for the remarkably workable public transportation.  It helped that many of the attractions are clustered together and were easy to reach on foot.

Some random takeaways:

• I have a deeper appreciation of Ireland's historic beef with Britain.  I had expected more of the city of Dublin, which was overrun by tourists, and not particularly architecturally appealing,  I really liked the town of Waterford, the site of the renowned crystal manufacturer and home of Irish revolutionary Thomas Meagher, who was a Montana territorial governor.  The statue of Meagher on his horse is a replica of the one in front of Montana's state capitol.  We were very impressed with the St. Patrick's National Cathedral, oddly enough a Protestant church in this overwhelmingly Catholic country.
• Northern Ireland has rebuilt beautifully since the peace settlement.  I wished we had spent more time there.
• Edinburgh, Scotland was my favorite city for its architecture, castle and scenery.  We spent one afternoon climbing the Arthur's Chair Crag (mountain) that overlooks this amazing city.
• The historic and well-preserved city of Bath, with its namesake mineral hot baths was a big surprise.  It brought into focus for me the Roman influence on Britain.  It didn't take a sharp eye to notice those influences.  We made a stop at remnants of Hardrian's Wall that Romans built across England from sea to sea to stop the Scots.  The city of York is surrounded by a centuries old, intact Roman wall, as is Bath
• We visited the castle in Cardiff, Wales to learn about the fiercely independent Welsh. Here we first encountered the environmental and economic devastation coal has wrought.  Buildings still look dirty black despite efforts to clean them.  Wales will need to adjust as coal is taken out of its employment equation.  Although buildings have been scrubbed, much soot remains.  We saw this in communities throughout our trip.
• It would take a life time to cover all the museums in these countries with such long histories.  In London alone we did the Imperial War Museum, the Tower of London, Kensington Palace, Tate Modern art museum, the National Gallery, the Science Museum, the Natural History Museum, and the British Museum.  We also toured Westminster Abbey.  In Cardiff we visited the castle; in Waterford, the glass factory; in Dublin, the national gallery, and Trinity College; in Edinburgh, the national gallery and castle with its Royal Walk.  Goodness, there was much more.  My favorite:  the Tate Modern.  My favorite church:  Westminster
• We visited Stonehenge and were impressed with efforts made there to keep tourists from over running the place.  Still, there were pretty good crowds on this early April visit.  You get the sense while visiting of something deeply spiritual and religious to the site where these giant stones were dragged and stacked and aligned with the movement of the sun and moon.  I was irritated by all the "selfie" taking folks who treated the visit lightly and as only a photo op (of themselves).
• Unfortunately, we had time for only one play in London's West End --- "The Book of Mormon" --- which we found highly entertaining if pretty gross.  We could have gone to a different theater production every day of the week for more than a month.  Katie would have liked a play at the Globe or National Theatre if we had the time.  We did take a stop at Stratford Upon-Avon for our taste of Shakespeare's birthplace, but I found it too touristy and overrun.  I would have liked to attend a classical music concert or opera, but again, no time.
• All the countries and cities have pub cultures, but none so robust as in Ireland, where Guinness is everywhere, and where the brewery is the biggest employer and omnipresent philanthropist.
• The scenery outside of London and the major cities is bucolic and green beyond green.  While Montana has cattle, the British Isles have sheep.  Much of the scenery reminded me of the Midwest, except for Scotland, where the landscape pitches, rolls and rises to mountains.
• Food?  London has every kind of food imagineable, and we sampled Tunisian, Thai, Lebanese, Italian and good old-fashioned English pub food, where I had my favorite meal on the trip --- a vegetarian lentil-based pie.  In the country-side, I found the food unimpressive.
• Lodging.  We stayed in old, historic hotels in Waterford, Ireland, Edinburgh, Our place in London was a chopped up Georgian building apartment where it was tough to turn around for lack of space. It's location was ideal, though, close to all of the Victoria Station transportation options.

Would I go back?  Probably not.  I prefer the more exotic eastern European destinations, but Edinburgh and London were worth the whole trip.

Was the trip a success?  Absolutely.

Hiking Sluice Boxes, Mount Helena

 

The first Douglasia alpine flowers we found on Mount Helena

Near the top of Mount Helena with controlled burn behind us

The waterfall at the start of the Sluice Boxes cliff trail

Pasque flowers at Sluice Boxes

Low water rimmed by ice on Belt Creek at Sluice Boxes

The overlook at the tunnel

Our first buttercups

Low, clear water on Belt Creek in Sluice Boxes

This is shoulder season, and while there is skiable snow in some places, we start looking around for places to hike.

We took the scenic drive to Helena and hiked up Mount Helena, and the following day traveled the short distance to the Sluice Boxes State Park where we walked to the train tunnel, dodging some ice and spots of slick trail.

In both spots we saw the first signs of real spring ---- alpine flowers:  pasque, douglasia, buttercups and prairie smoke.

And, on our hike through the Sluice Boxes we encountered rain rather than snowfall.

In Helena we walked upwind from a controlled burn in the Helena National Forest just south of Mount Helena.  It fouled the air through most of the Helena Valley, but we were clear on the mountain.

There's a major snowstorm predicted for the weekend, so I haven't put up my skis yet, but there are hopeful signs of spring all around us.