About Canada

Its been a beautiful last ten days or so after a miserable summer, weather wise, a real “Indian Summer”.

We have been busy in the store but I managed to get out last weekend for a hike up to Healey Pass. A trip that I have been meaning to take for the last couple of years.

I set off about 8.30 and you could feel the onset of winter. The walk was wonderful, about 4.5 hours round trip. In the clearings winter hinted at its approach with a thick layer of frost. The scenery was the usual spectacular, water falling down mountain sides and lakes falling into lakes. But it was made breathtaking by the fall colours.

I am no photographer but I took some snapshots and a bit of video.

It’s no wonder that artists are so inspired when the live in or visit this area, you would have to have something wrong with you not to be.

One artist who I think captures it is one of my favourites, Mark Sharp, actually thats a bit misleading as we wouldn’t show any work we didn’t really like. But I think that this time of year is captured really well in his Fall Leaves.

Its days like these that make you stop and appreciate why you live here.

Its Thanksgiving (Canadian) this weekend, what are you going to do? – Happy Thanksgiving.

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So the roads to places like Takakkaw Falls, Yoho National Park close on the 12th October. Its officially coming to the end of the season and we have two weekends to revisit favourite places.

Takakkaw is one of the places I take visitors, its beautiful and easy for the not so fit. Here in the store at About Canada, Banff . I often show people the photos of the falls by Bruno Engler

The other image that I really like of the falls is the one from the series of street banners that Parks Canada commissioned local artist Max Elliott to create.

Winter comes next with a whole host of other things to do but there are so many great places that now become unavailable for the Winter. Which are your favourites and where was best this year?.

(I finally figured out how to enable comments!)

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Its been so wet recently that, in the absence of any real scenery due to low cloud, all there has been for our visitors to do is to shop.

However I really thought that window shopping was an exclusively human wet weather pastime. That is until, twice in one afternoon, we had a window shopper at About Canada, Banff in the form of a squirrel.


He had a proper look around, left to look at other stores, then came back to have another look around the Gallery. I believe he had left his wallet in the car as he didn’t buy anything that day.

I was left wondering if it is THE Banff squirrel. Do you recognise this squirrel?.

That night it snowed and today Banff is beautiful again for our guests, and squirrels.

(Having read the following I am pretty sure it was a squirrel not a chipmunk)

The first thing is to recognize that a chipmunk is different from the only squirrel that is similar, Golden-mantled Ground-Squirrel (right). That colorful squirrel is widespread in wooded open country throughout mountainous western North America. Although the Golden-mantled Ground-Squirrel has black-and-white body stripes, as do chipmunks, it lacks any stripes on the face. It is not a chipmunk, but is in a genus (Spermophilus) with many other ground-squirrels.

          

An interesting set of prints that we have in our store About Canada, Banff, is a trilogy by Canadian artist Blake Richardson.

Blake has produced a series of photographs that in themselves cause one to reflect upon their deeper meaning.

Having transferred the original photograph to canvas he transforms the piece by using oil paints to define, in a subtle way, the images he finds in the photograph.

To me they are neat on a couple of levels. I see the circle of life in the trilogy:

Stare Away is the beginning, birth.

River of Life is the the journey, life.

Spirit Path is the end with the light at the end of the path, death.

Then on another level are all the hidden images that you only see as you peer into the print.

For example in these two extracts magnifications of the images alone are: Pegasus, Hippo, Unicorn, Arctic Fox, Lemur, Badger, Butterfly, Giraffe, Lioness &, Cubs, Lion, Domestic Cat, Gorilla, Rhino & Baby, Buffalo, Puffin, Panda, Terrier, Spider, Red Poodle, Queen, Horse, Pig and Reindeer

and: Turtle, Fairy Family, Mink, Wolf, 2 Bears, Coyote, White Buffalo, Mountain Lion, Raccoon, Fairy in Flight, Deer, Unicorn, Goose, Fawn, Heron, Hummingbird, Fox, Skunk and Opossum

There are not many art works that you put on your wall that cause you to see new things each day and which also give cause for pondering the meaning. Quite neat don’t you think.

How many of the images did you find?.

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I love the legends that artists provide us with when they make pieces for us at our store About Canada, Banff.

One of our favourite jewellers Bill Finn is of First Nation origins.

Bill hand engraves all his sterling silver jewellery pieces and has sent us a Dragonfly pendant with a gold tail.

The pendant came with the legend of the Dragonfly’s tail:-

A Grandmothers Raven Tale

Frog was sitting on a water lily leaf in the sun. Turtle swam up and took Frog’s leg in his mouth to drown him. Dragonfly saw this, flew down and bit Turtle on the head. Turtle let frog go and bit Dragonfly’s tail off. Dragonfly tried to fly but tumbled over and over in the air until he landed on the lake’s bank.

Raven had been watching and flew down to dragon’s side. Raven said how brave Dragonfly had been and that Frog was one of his family.

So Raven gave Dragonfly a Raven feather for his tail so he could fly again.

I think thats a neat legend, do you like it?.

          

We went to some friends for a barbecue this weekend. It was really neat as, though I don’t have a musical bone in my body, most of the attendees were musicians and they were jamming away for most of the evening, ranging from folk songs to Beatles numbers. It was a really good night.

One big surprise was a tiny visitor, in the form of a hummingbird. I thought the hummingbirds had long since gone. Usually they are pretty timid but this one just went to the feeder in the middle of the crowded deck.

The hummingbird is one of the favourite images that we sell in the store at About Canada, Banff .

One of the suprisingly popular lines, in this modern age, is the range of cross stitch patterns. We they are bought by young and older alike.

The publishers have just released a new image in the line, Sue Coleman’s Rufus Hummingbird

Have a look at the One of the suprisingly popular lines, in this modern age, is the range cross stitchcomplete range of patterns available.

          

At About Canada, Banff one of the neat things about running the store / gallery is meeting the artist. This month we were privilged to have Leo Arcand, a well known First Nation carver, call by to see if we would like to represent his work.

Of course we jumped at the chance. Leo is a Woodland Cree sculptor from the Alexander First Nations reserve in Northern Alberta. He works mainly in soapstone, drawing his inspiration from a deep spirituality and keen belief that there must be a balance in all things.

It was a pleasure to meet him and to take on his work.

The initial pieces that we have taken are:

Grandmother Bear

Protecting Spirit

Thundering Eagle

My favourite is the Protecting Spirit, which is yours?.

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At About Canada, Banff we have taken on the work of Carol Bortenlanger in the form of a “Western Legends Series” that she has created for us.

The Western Legends Series is a collection of limited edition prints of graphite drawings from Carol Bortenlanger. These depict three legends of the Alberta west.

Namely:

Chief Crowfoot, who was a chief of the Siksika First Nation in the late 1880′s. He was a fierce warrior but tried to obtain peace instead of warfare. When the North West Mounted Police came west to keep order he negotiated for peace with the other chiefs then signed Treaty 7 with Colonel Macleod in 1877.

Bruno Engler, who came to the Rockies from Switzerland in 1939 as a mountain guide and photographer and became a legend in his mountain career. He taught mountain warfare to the Canadian army, worked as a ski instructor, mountain guide, actor photographer and was one of the Canadian Rockies’ great story tellers and enduring characters.

Sam Livingstone, who was a very colourful pioneer in the 1880′s and has been called ‘Calgary’s first citizen’, as he was one of the first to build a house in the Calgary area. He is famous for his involvement in the Gold Rush, buffalo hunting, fur trading, bringing new ideas to farming and ranching and was the largest cattle dealer at the time.

Originally from Saskatchewan, Carol now resides in Calgary. She showcases our heritage through portraits of western and mountain legends, as well as rodeo themes, using primarily graphite and charcoal. Carol is a member of the Canadian Institute of Portrait Artists and has been asked to exhibit at the 2008, 2009 and 2010 Calgary Stampede Western Art Gallery / Art Auction.

Who would you add as a Western legend?

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Living in such a beautiful place as Banff, in Banff National Park, you just have to take advantage of your blessings.

We have been doing that, hence the lack of posts. On Saturday my wife andI decided to try out the new Legacy Trail, a cycle route linking Banff and Canmore. Its about 25 kilometers and a fairly easy ride (except forthe constant prevailing headwind, in both directions!). We did the trail, which is mostly complete now, in just over an hour.

We had acouple of beers and lunch in Canmore at The Wood Restaurant & Lounge, at the corner of Main Street and 8th Avenue. It was good torelax the legs, taking in the breathtaking views from the patio. I highly recommend it.

However I do not recommend 2.5 pints of lovely draught beer if you have to cycle 25k home. For the first 10 my legs felt like lead.

As a form of self flagellation I cycled up Mnt Norquay when I got back to Banff. My wife, who is much more sensible than me, went home and opened a bottle of wine and put a pizza in the oven.

On Monday I went for a cycle up to 2 Jack to join friends who had decided to camp out for a few nights, coming in to town to work during the day. We had a pleasant drink sat overlooking the lake as the sun went down.

On Tuesday we decided to take a canoe trip. What an adventure we had.

We dropped off the bikes at the ‘put in’ at the 1A turn off then headed off up to Castle Junction to put in. We set off and were doing just fine pottering along what seemed like a smoothly flowing river. The overhanging trees gave the river the feel of an elegant grove. The sky was cloudy but it felt it would burn off soon, though it never did – we found later that it was smoke from the BC fires.

However after about 20 minutes it was getting a bit like an amusement park ride. The river narrowed and got faster. It kept dividing and rejoining. At one divide we made the wrong choice. The chanel made a 90 degree turn. We managed to just get around the turn avoiding a fallen tree but found ourselves moving at speed sideways into the roots of another. I tried to stop myself going into the roots with my oar but then my oar got stuck and whacked me in the face causing us to capsize. We were in the fast flowing, glacial melt, cold river and managed to get to the side. The offending oar, my wife’s coat and sandals were missing. Most of our gear was tied into the canoe but in one water filled bag were my camera and phone, both soaked – hence the lack ofphotos.

We carried on and at one point pulled up to see if lunch was edible. It was not, but we quickly moved on when we saw cougar tracks and realised that we might be lunch!.

We came across some pretty rough rapids. There was a sign to get out and portage the canoe. However only one of us had shoes so instead we donned our bike helmets and set off through the rapids, and the next set. It was very exciting!.

The whole trip took 4 hours. We successfully overcame a ducking, navigated rapids and idled down long silent stretches. We had people waving to us from observation posts like we were intrepid explorers on the home run. We had fun. We came across nobody else on the river. Where else in the world can you have such beauty, and such extents of beauty, all to yourself.

To round off the day we cycled the Legacy Trail from the highway 1A to Banff.

On the way I saw a bumper sticker which said “The meaning of life is to live it”. How true I thought.?

          

We took the time to go for a float down the Bow River, from the falls, this weekend.

Even though it was a long weekend and there were loads of visitors in town it gets peaceful five minutes away from the crowds. We have our own canoes but there are rental facilities in Banff allowing guests staying to enjoy the solitude of following the Bow Rivers Journey.

We have a print at About Canada, Banff from Mark Sharp by that name, which is very popular.

In my opinion, it has a companion print from his collection in Rundle Over The Bow

Mark Sharp is a local artist with a keen following. He is not particularly prolific as his winter and much of his summer is taken up with training the ladies olympic skiers. His fans always eagerly await his latest works.