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| Western Canada
- September 2010 |
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| As we headed off to Canada in September, I don’t think any of knew what to expect in this vast country and what experience of Canada we would have during our 18 day tour, start in Calgary, then up to Banff, Jasper before taking the Rocky Mountaineer train from Jasper to Vancouver and then to our final destination of Vancouver Island. |
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The scene was set very early on as the Sporting Nomads BC meet the night before at a hotel near Gatwick Airport for their early morning flight Calgary and the customary swooping of allocated seats, we arrived into Calgary on a National Bank Holiday weekend, which seemed to bring the city to a standstill, apart from the 100s of people trying to queue up for passport control, unlucky for us the escalator was still letting people join the back of the queue, lucky for us the Tour Manager was hand to stop the escalator before we all ended up on the floor, not a nice welcome, but as always we laughed it off after the event and it wasn’t going to spoil our tour.
Our first day in Calgary we another one for the book, after our first stop at the University of Calgary, sports complex, home to speed skating and ice hockey or coach decided it was bank holiday and wasn’t going to go any further, lucky for us, we flagged down a local bus and made our way back to Calgary, just in time for the Calgary Pride parade, which opened our eyes for a few of us! |
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Our first match against Calgary BC, was a good opening match for the team, but with the strong Chinese influence and tough matching winning shoots, we came a very close second. Moving out of Calgary we headed into the Rockies’ mountains and the picturesque town of Banff, were we took the opportunity to explore the magnificent mountains and lakes in the area, Queen Edna of Northampton took the opportunity to explore her Kingdom of Lake Louise , whilst other had their first sightings of bears!
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We moved onto Jasper, stopping on route at the Athabasca Glacier, and board the snow coach and experience time on the Glacier and the “Ice Age Adventure”.
We boarded the Rocky Mountaineer train in Jasper and enjoyed being spoilt for the next two days as we crossed the mountains in style, our overnight stop in Kamloops, was another night to remember as we celebrated Nan and Edna’s birthday in style at the “Rhythms on the Rails” Show, a step back in history and a good old sing song (for those who could remember the words). Once we arrived in Vancouver, we played our next two matches, the first being at the spectacular Stanley Park BC, were you had to stop to wave to the Japanese Tourist buses as they passed bye, the third very social match was against the Granville Park BC, where the afternoon homemade cakes were to die for.
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We took the opportunity to head into the mountains again, this time taking the gondola cable car, up Grouse Mountain, to see the lumber jack show the giant wood carvings and the two grizzle bear which have been bred in captivity.
We crossed over to Vancouver Island for our last two bowls fixtures on tour and unbeknown to us our local tour guide decided to take us on a tour of his own family history, not the best tour in the world, but certainly a good laugh.
Our final two social fixtures on tour were very enjoyable at the end of the season, and we were grateful to the clubs for keeping their greens open the extra week to allow us to play.
The tour was another great success both on and off the greens.
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