I got up at 6am, reset the bed to a lounge and showered. The first breakfast announcement was called for 7am so I headed over for that. The omelette was delightful. It turns out that we were around 9 hours behind schedule and so expected to reach Edmonton around 3.30pm.

So I settled in for a day of listening to my audiobook (Tom Clancy novel) and a bit of sporadic photography from the dome carriage and my compartment. The landscape was delightful, being the prairies of middle Canada. It would be great to see in the late Spring, although then I’d want to spend more time in the Northern Territories as the ice melts and the animals come out of hibernation. Anyway, I enjoyed the small towns as well as the fields we passed.

A few photos from the train:

And this last one is as we are coming into Edmonton Station.

The source of the information below was my Lonely Planet Canada guide.

Edmonton has a population of around 730-800,000 depending on the source. Edmonton is Alberta’s second largest city and is a government town. It is also called a frontier town, with a vast and empty northern landscape. It does not have the same number of tourist sites that even cities like Winnipeg have. The biggest tourist attraction seems to be the West Edmonton Mall, which is the largest in North America.

The indigenous history is traced to the ancestors of the Blackfoot and Cree tribes back by around 5000 years. In the 18^th century, Europeans first arrived in the area, with a trading post and then trappers and various traders. In 1870, the government opened up the area by pioneers. The railway arrived in 1891, and growth sped up.

The aboriginal tribes transferred their land rights to the government in a series of treaties between 1871 and 1921 in return for money, lands for reservations and hunting rights.

After arrival at the railway station, I got my bags and by 4pm I was in a taxi to my hotel, being the MacEwan University Residences. It’s a pretty smart idea to hire out unused rooms at the university to tourists. There are a few multi storey university buildings around, as well as a large number of condominium blocks within close proximity. There are also a number of fast food and not so fast food restaurants close-by, as well as many shops. I headed out to get some groceries, and then unpacked, browsed the local newspaper and went to bed.

Today is my rail trip from Winnipeg (Manitoba) to Edmonton (Alberta). The trip was expected to take 19 hours, leaving at 11.45am today and arriving at 6.25am tomorrow, so I booked a single sleeper compartment again. I received an email last night, however, from Via Rail to advise that the train had left Toronto late and so I was advised that there may be a delay in Winnipeg.

I had packed the night before, so I had breakfast, bought a newspaper and some water and snacks for the train, and took a taxi to the railway station, arriving at around 9.30am. The train was originally scheduled to arrive at 8am, and not surprisingly given the email, it had not arrived by the time I checked my suitcases.

The train was expected to arrive at 10am. Then 12 noon. It eventually arrived at 1.40pm, with a depart time of 2.45pm. Really I wasn’t too concerned. I had a couple of magazines and some audiobooks, so I was set. Plus because we didn’t leave on time (when I would have had lunch), one of the Via Rail staff arranged for me to get some food and drink. There turned out to be an issue with one of the switches and one of the wheels, so there was to be a short delay as a couple of parts were sourced.

We got onto the train around 2.30pm, still waiting for the parts to arrive. There was some heavy traffic and bad weather that caused some delays. We had dinner at 6pm on the train, and I went to bed to read at 7pm still waiting to hear when we’d leave Winnipeg. The staff did everything they could to make us comfortable and to keep us regularly informed about how things were progressing. They were great. Some of the more regular passengers said that delays happen all the time, especially in winter, with snow etc. Eventually the train started to roll at 8.40pm, but then stopped and started a few times. We ended up leaving the station at 9.35pm, around 10 hours late. Which was fine with me because it meant I would get to Edmonton at a reasonable time, not 6.22am. Plus I believe the same with the train as with planes, I’d much rather be delayed and ensure that whatever I am travelling on is mechanically sound so I will not get stuck in the middle of nowhere, or worse. So I switched off the light to go to sleep.

Today I slowed down just a little bit because Winnipeg had a high wind chill level, taking the minus 27C up to something close to minus 40C. Therefore when I headed outside it did not take too long for my face and head to hurt – my face and head only being covered up by a scarf, a beanie and a hoodie from my jacket, as against the three layers on the rest of my body. Again like an instant ice cream headache. So I walked behind various buildings to keep away from the wind and then headed across to the closest skywalk to get to the Manitoba Art Gallery.

Where Montreal and Toronto have underground cities (tunnels linking various buildings with shops and train stations so you can walk through much of the downtown without getting out into the snow, rain and cold), Winnipeg has skywalks. These are walks that are linking buildings at second floor level, a level above the street, also with shops in some places, however Winnipeg’s is significantly smaller in scope than the other two mentioned above. The first photo below shows one of the skywalks (above and to the right of Boston Pizza) taken from another skywalk link, with the second photo being inside one of the links. Not as busy as the larger cities, but still as useful.

But it worked for me. I got to the art gallery in about 10 minutes. Below is a photo of the Art Gallery, the building in the middle. This photo is of interest to me because it shows (a) piles of snow on the sidewalks that usually get pushed away within 48 hours in the eastern cities like Quebec City, Montreal and Toronto but apparently not so much in Winnipeg from what I have read, and (b) the Union Station is the building to the left with the dome. Interestingly, Winnipeg and Toronto’s railway stations are both called Union Station.

I went inside and bought my ticket and then headed into the first exhibit, on the first floor. This was of Inuit Sculptures. Inuit inhabitants of the Canadian Arctic initially carved functional items for themselves, however as trading occurred and extended over the 19^th and 20^th centuries, they started to carve articles for sale/ trading. The most common material they used to carve was stone, and the type depended upon what they could hand quarry. Because some had minimal access to useable stone, they carved with materials such as ivory, antler and whale bone. The Manitoba Art Gallery has one of the largest collections of Inuit carvings and has plans to commence a new gallery to display these and the rest of its collection more appropriately. More about that later. Some of this work is very intricate.

After that exhibit, I went back into the lobby to have a look at a couple of the large tapestries the gallery had on its walls. These 16^th century tapestries are called the Bisham Abbey collection, as they once adorned the walls of the Bisham Abbey in Buckinghamshire, on the country estate of King Henry VIII. Herewith an example of one.

I then headed up to the second floor to see an exhibition of sculptures under the title “Starting with Rodin”, by Francois Auguste Rodin and those taught / inspired by him. There were around 30 sculptures in the exhibition. The first photo is of two marble items by Rodin, ”Tete de danseuse” and “Small Torso”, with a story of Rodin having sculpted these (and others) for a planned Museum of decorative Arts in Paris, which never went ahead. The next is a marble sculpture entitled “Crouching Venus” by Italian Pierre Barzanti. The most important item, in the exhibition in the bronze sculpture “Danaid” by Rodin. Danaid is a femme fatale who murders her husband using a hairpin, and is an apparent reference to ancient mythology via the Italian poet Dante Alighieri.

After this, I reviewed the plans and model for the new art gallery which is due to commence construction in the next 18 months. It has a number of really good features, the best for me being the Visual Vault. Knowing that galleries own significantly more artworks than are displayed at any one time, the gallery (apart from the usual exhibition spaces) will have a cylindrical galls-walled art storage facility which will display thousands of artworks, and where the public can visualise curatorial and conservation activities. An interesting way for the public to see more than the usual displays.

After that, I headed up to the third floor, where there are two exhibition spaces, one I would say has about one third of the floor, the other with two thirds, as well as the lobby space. The lobby space itself is taken up with a large size model of “The Thinker” by Rodin, this one believed to have been created by Rodin students or ancestors after his death from the original plaster cast moulds Rodin used from the original sculpture to make other casts.

The smaller exhibition space starts with a smallish area that is set aside for an installation by Vernon Ah Kee called “cantchant”. It’s an Australian Aboriginal display, some surfboards painted in the colours of the Australian Aboriginal flag, plus some signs on the wall, going through to a room with a very large split screen showing film of Dale Richards, an Australian surfer, surfing.

The remainder of that side of the exhibits is a storyline both visual and electronic of Inuit, Metis and First Nation artists and the sorts of art that they create. There was a fascinating range of modes and styles, and stories of artists and their communities, as well as the cooperatives that they use to promote their artworks. The artworks and the videos were quite fascinating.

The larger of the two exhibition spaces on that floor consists of a large number of paintings as well as some sculptures, by Canadian artists. This took me a good hour to go through. The painting themes ranged from religious art through to portraits, old style landscapes, newer techniques, and to ones that look like they were done at day care by a 3 year old. There was even a Pablo Picasso lithograph on paper “Tete de femme fond noir” (below). Below is also a photo of a very small portion of this display.

By then I headed back to the hotel for a quick break before then heading off to my final visit in Winnipeg, The Forks.

The Forks is a small area on the river where the river splits into two. It is just behind and past Canadas Human Rights Museum. It is a little difficult to see given the river is frozen and covered in snow, however in the below photo, the Red River comes from the left and “forks” into two to the right of the photo. The Red River continues on the far side of the concrete bridge pylon (and then heads passed the buildings in the photos middle) and the Assinboine River comes off on the close side of the concrete bridge pylon.

This is an area of historical significance, with artefacts showing that early aboriginal groups arrived in the area over 6000 years ago. Artefacts uncovered included hunting and fishing tools. The site was visited and transversed through by multiple peoples, and was used as a meeting place and a trading site. As it is now with its markets, restaurants, ice skating rinks and walking trails with stone plates of historical information, along with models of some of the artefacts located. Some parts even expose the sedimentary changes on the river walls over the 6000 years and earlier.

It started to cool down quickly, so I headed back to my hotel to pack in readiness to travel to Edmonton tomorrow morning.

Today I headed over to the Manitoba Museum. I took a pathway along the frozen river. The main river is the Red River, with the smaller offshoot coming off the fork being the Assiniboine River. The name comes from the Assiniboine peoples who were one of the First Nations from areas including the central area of Canada including Manitoba, the province of which Winnipeg is the Capital.

On the way, I passed a plaque / sign on the riverfront relating to Scots being cleared from their land in 1812. It turns out that in the 18^th century to early in the 19^th century period, there was a series of clearances (the Highland Clearances), or forced displacement, of of Scottish people from their traditional land tenancies, which resulted in a change from small scale agriculture to large scale sheep raising by the aristocratic landowners. These Scottish peoples were moved to the coast, as well as North America (including Canada) and Australasia. Thus, some of these peoples settled in the Red River valley close to where Winnipeg is settled.

Winnipeg sits within the Canadian Prairies, which covers the provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. The museum has a large range of exhibits, with a walkthrough of the main gallery being a bit like an Ikea showroom, where the walkthrough is defined and you just start and follow the triangles. This is the exhibit right at the start, and represents the Red River Buffalo Hunt, which the Metis’ undertook on the open plains to catch, kill and process buffalos. In many cases, the whole families took part, some to hunt the buffalos, the others to process the meat and skins. Metis is a French word derived from a Latin word meaning “to mix”. They were described as generally a mix of First Nation mothers and French Canadian fathers from the early 1800s, and by the mid 1800s they were the largest mix in the province.

It’s a precursor to the whole gallery which is very visual as well as having some of the newer technology electronics. But mostly it’s displays, and some of them are quite large installations.

The gallery then moved into minerals. The geology of Canada is made up of various minerals, the backbone of North America, which are between 1.7 and 3 billion years old. There is a display of minerals from “the Canadian Shield” representing this backbone.

After this, the next section related to fossils found within the rocks that archaeologists and others have uncovered. There were some very interesting displays including large fossils, or at least examples of them, in this section. After a display with questions around the extinction from 65.5 million years ago, the displays moved onto the Ecosystem, and where herbivores and carnivores fit. There were also some neat childrens’ areas, including one where they are taught to use a brush and trowel to look for artefacts in soil. Then I turned a corner and got scared by these skeletons.

Then next few displays were around current day animals and their hunting of other animals, the various lifestyles of the First Peoples including hunting, cooking, and use of tools in their daily life. Much like the similar displays in Halifax and Montreal. But I really liked some of their installation style displays that showed different parts of daily life. One was a cave with torches available to walk through and look for bats.

At the end of this gallery was a replica ship, the Nonsuch, which was built as a merchant ship in 1650 and travelled in 1668-1669 under the Captaincy of Zackariah Gillam. It was the first ship to travel into the Hudson Bay – the large Bay to the north of Manitoba and Ontario – the path of which then became a regular trade stop. The model was open to the public but the queue was pretty long so I just looked over the side and headed to the next gallery.

The following gallery was based around the changing environment and the exploitation of various parts such as forestry and mining. There were a number of interesting displays including models and equipment / vehicles used in this area. This followed onto the interrelationship between the First Peoples and settlers, including the development of treaties. It included information about First Peoples fighting for the country in the World Wars.

Interestingly, the next gallery was made up of a mockup of a street and a railway with two stories of buildings that were full sized to walk through, but the buildings themselves were narrow. It included a church, barber, grocery store, pub, and a number of other buildings and shops. It was really neat.

I sat in the movie theatre for about 10 minutes to watch a couple of Charlie Chaplin films. I always enjoy laughing at his exploits.

That was the end of the museum. All in all, a very interesting series of exhibits with a lot of interesting things to learn about the history of the lands and its peoples, and well worth a few hours to visit. I then headed over to the collocated Planetarium and Science Discovery Centre. I saw a 25 minute film on the Planetarium roof / screen narrated by Harrison Ford called “Are We Alone”. It was interesting but definitely created for a younger audience. However the visuals were great.

I then went into the Science Centre, which again was more for families but I did get to play with some of the exhibits. There were a huge number of different things kids could play with, and definitely some parents using the exhibits to teach their kids some things around water flow and nature.

So then it was after 3pm and getting even colder, so I headed back to my hotel to have a Canadian Crown Royal whiskey and dry or two. I then watched more of the current affairs shows in between watching the USA beat Russian on goal shots in the Junior Ice Hockey semi-finals.

Then it was 10pm and I turned off the TV and went to bed.

The train was due to arrive at Winnipeg Station at 8am, so I got up at 6.45am, had breakfast and a shower, converted the bed back to the lounge, packed my bag to disembark and then headed to the dome car to grab some video on my GoPro. At around 8am the train was stopped around 20 minutes short of Winnepeg. We were advised that there was to be a delay of around an hour, as the train coming the other way had been delayed significantly, and was at Winnipeg Station being prepared for the leg from Winnipeg to Toronto.

In the end, we didn’t reach Winnipeg Station ourselves until 11.30am, 3 and a half hours delayed. But given the level of snowfall and storms in the central and eastern parts of Canada, these delays aren’t surprising.

I got to the hotel at 12.30pm, and checked in. I then went for a walk to the Canadian Museum of Human Rights. It was only 3 blocks away but it took me some time. It was soooooo cold. It felt like it was colder than Anchorage Alaska. The temperature was -19C, but with the wind it felt much worse. This is the museum.

The museum itself was fascinating. The museum has 6 levels of galleries, with stairs then up to an 8^th floor viewing room. On the ground floor is one of the temporary exhibitions (which you can always tell as they are the ones you aren’t allowed to take photos at).

This exhibition is called “1867 – Rebellion and Confederation” and is in line with the 150^th Confederation of Canada celebration. The exhibition gives a long history of the period up to Confederation on 1 July 1867. It starts in the 1830s when the area consisted of Upper Canada, Lower Canada, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Prince Edward Island. The issue with the regions was that they had different values and power was in the hands of a small privileged group of mainly British citizens (including the Governor General and his advisors), these regions being British colonies.

The exhibition then provides visual and audio-visual presentations around groups of reformers wanting to bring democracy and shared values. The reformers’ demands were variously rejected and so this led to rebellion and battles in 1837. The loyalists (keeping the status quo) won and this led to 1500 arrests, 250 deported (including to Australia) and 50 rebels were hung. Over time this situation led to the “Act of Union” in 1840, passed by the British Parliament. The Act established the Province of Canada, created a single Parliament, but also caused significant opposition due to banishment of French language for official use, and suspending specific French responsibilities etc. Over 15 year, the groups worked within the Act to remove the most onerous sections. This led down the path to the Confederation in 1967.

The museums levels are linked by a series of ramps. These ramps are made from Alabaster with lighting behind, to “light the visitors’ path through the rights museum”.

The second level gallery’s displays are around “What Are Human Rights”. This includes different displays as well as video of 6 specific people who talk through what they believe are human rights and why. The museum itself does not provide one specific answer to this questions. Different people have different ideas. There are also stories from around the world of peoples who have been active against those people and organisations (including Governments) who have sought to reduce rights, including freedom of speech. An example here is a Chilean arpillera (vivid patchwork stitched onto sacks) to protest against Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship (1973 to 1990).

Also on this floor are displays entitled “Indigenous Perspectives” being the concepts of rights for the First Nations, Metis and Inuit peoples; and “Canadian Journeys”, which provide stories of different Canadians’ experiences in human rights.

The level 3 gallery “Protecting Legal Rights in Canada” covered legal aspects of Canadian human rights and how they have changed over time with legal changes. The gallery has a circular desk with 13 or 14 touch screens to enable the visitor to see and hear the digital living tree of changes.

It also has a garden of contemplation in the middle. The rocks are basalt imported from overseas. Basalt was chosen as it is one of the types of stone that are found on all continents on earth.

The level 4 gallery has a range of topics including “Examining the Holocaust” and relates to the build up of issues from the end of WWI through to WWII but has terrible stories of what occurred to Polish, Jewish and other groups over this time; “Turning Points for Humanity” which is based around the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights and peoples working tirelessly to convert this into reality; “Breaking the Silence” which is around people speaking out about mass atrocities, and has a special set of digital study tables and other resources around Genocides; and “Actions Count”, being low key and not so low key action taken by various members of the communities to push back against human rights.

An example in Canada is “Pink Shirt Day” which occurs annually to commemorate a day when a year 9 student was bullied and called gay by other students in Nova Scotia for wearing a pink shirt to school. Two year 12 boys found out and bought 75 pink tshirts which they lined up with their friends to wear and hand out at school the next day in support of the younger student.

The photo of glass panels represents a wall of broken glass, which is based on Kristallnacht, or “the Night of Broken Glass” on the nights of 9-10 November 1938 when paramilitary forces and German civilians launched a pogrom against Jews by ransacking Jewish homes, hospitals and schools, which included the deaths of 91+ Jews and tens of thousands of males being incarcerated.

The level 5 gallery covers “Rights Today” and again uses multiple audio-visual as well as models and samples of different materials etc. to look into current issues in human rights internationally. One of the displays was of Malala Yousafzia, the girl from Pakistan who pushes for education for girls around the world. The display shows her Nobel Peace Prize as well as the dress she was wearing as a schoolgirl when she was shot by the Taliban.

The level 6 gallery, the second of the temporary exhibition spaces, had an exhibition entitled “Empowering Women”. This provides some of the work and connections from a range of women across Asia, Africa, and the Americas including creating grassroots cooperatives and how these have been transforming their communities. There are video as well as Virtual Reality headsets that display different women’s groups achievements. The VR headsets had to be booked as they were quite popular. I unfortunately didn’t have the time to wait for them but I did watch the video with headphones. The stories showed how strong the women of these communities were to continue on and develop these cooperatives, including at times when their husbands and sons had been murdered by guerrillas and other killers.

The visit was fascinating, and after 3 hours I had still only scratched the surface of what was available. However they were closing so I got kicked out. I then headed back to the hotel for dinner, a shower, and some 24 hour news and a current affair channel hopping. That was exciting.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

Today was totally on the train. I’m really enjoying this single compartment. It is relatively small. It has a lounge chair on one side and a sink and toilet, with as wooden and vinyl seat that goes over the toilet when not in use, on the other side. And behind the lounge chair is the pull-down bed. The room also has shelves and a locker style safe up high for storage and access at night.

I had breakfast, then had a shower and converted the bed back into the lounge chair.  Then read a little and then had lunch in the dining car, and spent a little time sitting in the dome car as well, talking with some of the other travellers as well as taking some photos.

We also got to stop at a town called Hornepayne for a half hour. The drivers had to change over and waste remove and new supplied brought on board. One of the passengers brought out his Phantom drone and got some good footage. I took some photos of the engines as they are out of bounds at all of the stations.

I then read a magazine (Newsweek) in my compartment and set the bed back up and lay on it and listened to an audiobook of a Tom Clancy novel (Executive Orders). I was still relatively full by the time dinner came along so I didn’t go to that. So at about 9pm it was normal bedtime so I shut down the book and got to sleep by around 11pm.

Today after breakfast I packed my bags as I was heading off.

I then went for a walk around Toronto city. First I went to the biggest of the 6 Chinatowns in Toronto.

The fruit and vegetables look very reasonably priced, at least compared to Karratha ($1 Canadian is worth $1.03 Australian).

I then headed over to Kensington Marketplace. It was interesting to see the architecture and the variety of front gardens of housing properties that have been turned into “shops” for selling all range of goods.

I then walked over to Little Italy, and like I had read, there is no longer a real Italian vibe to the area. There are, however, a large number of cafes and other similar shops. Also a range of different churches in that area.

After this, I headed down to Liberty Village. This is an area that is located in one of Toronto’s oldest areas, having been developed in the late 1700s. However it has a large number of new condominium blocks through it, built in the last decade or so.

I then decided on my walk back to the hotel from the other side of town, to head into the CN Tower and take a ride in its lift up to the viewing station near the top. I took a selfie before going in.

Once inside, the lift took 57 seconds to get from the ground floor to the viewing station. Here are a few photos, including one of the islands across the water (where I had taken the ferry previously for photos of the city). The CN Tower was initially only being built to be an aerial to solve the telecommunications issues with the rapidly growing city. However as development started, it was thought beneficial to build in a restaurant and other options to attract tourists. In 1995, it was made one of the 7 Wonders of the Modern World.

After exiting the CN Tower, I walked back to the hotel, picked up my bags at 4pm and headed to Union Station Toronto. As I had booked a single sleeper compartment, I was allowed to sit in the Via Rail Business Lounge whilst awaiting my train to leave at 10pm. I got to read a couple of business magazines with free coffee, soft drink and most importantly, hot chocolate. I also watched some of the New Year’s Eve fireworks displays from around the world, including from Sydney. The train left at just over 10pm. The train was to take 33 hours, to arrive in Winnipeg at 8am on 2^nd January 2017.