Sunshine, Scenery and Sport in Canada MEALS in the mountains
always taste good, but especially in the Canadian Rockies. Your body may be tired from long -walking, but your soul is somehow rested and demands and obtains the simple elementary things of life—food, air, sleep.
Comparisons are dangerous, but lovely as Switzerland is, I unhesitatingly prefer the Rocky Mountains for sheer grandeur and beauty. Indeed, the second finest view I have seen in the world (the first is in Italy) is from the veranda of the hotel at Lake Louise, looking across the hyaline waters of the lake to the white and living splendour of Victoria Glacier.
But to' come to details : a fairly comprehensive trip to Canada—which is really a continent as well as a country, for the Rocky Mountains alone are as big as thirty Switzerlands --should take at least 'three months: But many visitors will not have so much time, and for those who have only three weeks available the C.P.R. tour from Liverpool, taking in Quebec, Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto and back to Liverpool, is to be recommended. The cost is £75 15s. first class, and £48 by " tourist third," with first class on' trains. A month's tour giving you fourteen days on land, and including New York and Chicago, costs £100 or £72 10s. if you go tourist third across the Atlantic. As I have already said, tourist third is to be strongly recommended for those who do not demand positive luxury in transportation.
The attractions of Canada are equal, if not superior, to those of the Continent, and £20 a week 'or less is really very cheap indeed considering the miles you cover and the new world you see: A transcontinental tour de -luxe by C.P.R. costs £195, and will take you right across Canada to Victoria and back, leaving August 0th and returning September 24th. On this trip from Liverpool and back you get two -days' wonderful scenery up the St. Lawrence ; see Quebec, the oldest city on the North American Continent ; gay Montreal, to which Americans flock, and rightly, 'for it is one of the pleasantest cities in the world ; Niagara Falls, Port Arthur and Port William with their vast grain elevators through which passes half the wheat of the world, the marvellous and fertile prairies, the mighty peaks of the Rockies, Vancouver looking forward eagerly to its mighty future, lovely Victoria nestling amidst her roses, the fruit valleys of Okanagan and Kootenay and Lake Louise, the incomparable. - A pageant of great cities and great resources that will, perhaps, give you a new idea of kmpire. Service and accommodation throughout this trip will have the cachet of the C.P.R., who are known for their efficiency from Victoria to Palm Beach, and from Quebec to Coronado.
Returning from Victoria, it would be a good plan to travel up through the Inland Passage to Prince Rupert—itself a most delightful and smooth three-day sea trip—and thence hick along the Canadian National Railway, stopping perhaps at Terrace, where there is considerable prospecting activity, and most certainly at Jasper Park, where-Lord Haig spent several days during his recent tour.
Jasper Park Lodge is a minature village of rustic bungalows from which you can go for some wonderful shooting trips. Equipment, guides; horses, &c., can all be arranged for on the spot, and the price is not high. Indeed, to see Canada pro- perly you must go out into camp. No man ever saw much of a country from a train window, because the land over which a train takes you is rarely typical of the country as a whole.. Sunshine, Scenery and Sport in Canada—Continued
Leaving the totem pole of Jasper Camp, you should certainly stop at Edmonton, a beautiful North Canadian city which is growing apace ; also a day at the Buffalo Reserve at Wain- right Park is well spent, for here the wild buffalo are in their natural habitat, living as they did long centuries before the white man came and almost exterminated them.
A newly organized club known as the Trail Riders of the Canadian Rockies merits mention in this column, for by using its facilities the traveller who has little time to spare and no knowledge of local conditions may get in a, few days an insight into camp life in Canada which would otherwise take him—or her—months to acquire. Two short excursions will be made, one—a three-day ride—starting near Castle on the Banff-Lake Louise road, and making a detour thence to Lake Louise ; and a five-day ride through the Mosquito Creek and past Bow Lake back to Lake Louise. There is an Indian Pow-Wow at Banff from July 5th to July 10th, and the trail rides will take place shortly afterwards, so that the visitor
will not only be able to see the. Indians in their natural sur- roundings but will also be able at small expense (about £3 a day) to enjoy the spectacular views of trails off the beaten track in one of the finest parts of the Rockies.
In conclusion, I would say this to those who believe in the things that the British Empire stands for : Learn something of Empire at first hand from our great and nearest eister nation. It is no impertinence to say that your outlook will be broadened not only as regards the possibilities of our race, but also as regards the future of the world. Get a feeling- realization of our Empire, as well as an intellectual conception of it. See how our relations overseas are working out the problems that face them. Even if you go there third class, it will be a happy and pleasant journey, and one hallowed, moreover, by an objective that is higher than that o= mere amusement. It will be, for all the incidental fun, a • pil- grimage in search of the precious things that the New World
can give the Old. Visit Canada this year. F. Y.
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