I wrote my formal review on my train trip from Vancouver to Toronto on VIA Rail’s “The Canadian” back in March, and I have neglected to write about my informal thoughts and highlights about this trip until now. There were several things worth talking about that I did not get to mention in my review. I want to talk about everything from the views, to the senior clientele, and everything in between. I will try to leave no stone unturned on my thoughts of this Trans-Canadian trip of a lifetime.
At Vancouver’s Pacific Central Station, there was a sign which had the train configuration for the trip. We were on the furthest Sleeper Plus train car from the skyline/dining cars for our train class. As I will mention later, getting from our cabin to the skyline and dining cars would prove to be quite a challenge.
As I was sitting in the outdoor lounge waiting to board the train, I made a mental note on the guests boarding this train. I would say that around 80-85% of the guests on this train trip were seniors, and I think I was one of the youngest people on this train. There were a few younger guests and backpackers on the train, but this was going to be a seniors trip that I needed to prepare myself for.
I had the opportunity to chat with many of the guests during the sittings in the dining cars for food, as well as in the lounge cars, and the thing that surprised me was that many of these guests have been on this train route before. Some guests remember taking the Vancouver-Toronto train ride decades ago during their childhoods and want to recapture the magic of cross-country travel by train. Others simply enjoy the ride while checking out all the views.
I want to talk about all the difficulties I had with VIA Rail’s “The Canadian”. The hallways in the sleeping cars are extremely skinny and there are few places where guests can cross if they are going in opposite directions. Not to mention that when you are walking through the train, the train can move violently, jostling you in every direction. Luckily, there are bars and walls where you can brace yourself. Sleeping in the cabin while it is moving proved to be a massive challenge, as any rocking on the train will wake me up, so I did not get one good night’s rest while on the train. There were a couple of nights where the train would rock so much that I thought the train was going to tip over. Showering in the train car shower was not as bad, but there were bars to keep yourself steady while you were cleaning yourself.
Every night after dinner, I would have a drink or two and sit in the park car lounge in the back of the train while working on the blog. Some nights, I would have the peace and quiet of being alone, while other times there would be guests having a conversation. A tall can of beer or a mixed drink was around $10-$12 CAD, and I racked up a hefty alcohol bill by the end of the trip. I think I spent over $100 CAD on alcoholic drinks over the course of this trip.
Outside of eating and sleeping, most of my time during the day would be sitting up in the panorama lounge, either in the lounge car or the park car at the back of the train and watching the landscapes with headphones in my ears. There was so much to see outside during the trip: from Vancouver and the Rocky Mountains to the Prairies and the woods of Northern Ontario. There was so much unspoiled beauty that I want to share the pictures of the views I saw. Some of these pictures are not the best, considering we were on a moving train and taking pictures through the window.
The VIA Rail staff will always point out places of interest coming up, and they will also point out upcoming animals that you can see, but you must be quick to get your camera out. I saw bighorn sheep, bison, deer, foxes, and coyotes. I only managed to get photos of the sheep and the deer.
Leaving Vancouver, we were alongside the Fraser River and I got this picture of the Port Mann Bridge near Surrey. I have some other pictures of the Fraser River as well.
The next day was a foggy and snowy morning along the North Thompson River and coming up to Mount Robson. I would not want to be alone out here, especially in the winter.
The next stop was Jasper National Park in Alberta, and we were in the heart of the Rocky Mountains. There was the clear blue glacier water of the Athabasca River, and then there were all the mountains. Truly a sight to behold.
We passed the Rocky Mountains and passed through some of Alberta’s small towns such as Hinton and Entwistle before arriving at Edmonton station in the evening, but I was ready for bed, so I did not hop off the train.
By the next morning, we were in the Prairies of Saskatchewan, and this was where I think people would get bored of the views, as the land was flat and there was not much to see in terms of natural landscapes.
We would not be in Saskatchewan without seeing some grain silos and elevators as we approached and passed the towns of Biggar, Allan, and Young.
Unfortunately, I slept through Manitoba so when I woke up, the train already crossed into Ontario. You start to see more wooded areas and lakes in the all too familiar snowy landscape.
We made a brief stop in the town of Sioux Lookout in Northern Ontario. I do not have a specific opinion of this town, but there was more First Nations influence in the northern towns and villages of Ontario.
Lastly, I managed to get this cool video of the train travelling through the snowy landscape in the back. It is trippy and hypnotic.
At this point, I was getting sick and tired of this train ride, and I was begging to get off. I still had another night to spend on the train until we pull into Toronto the next day. If I were to give my first thought about VIA Rail’s “The Canadian”, it would be that I was glad to get to experience this train ride, even with all my struggles. I know that not a lot of people get to do something like this, so I am glad that I did. With that said, I will never do this trip again, and riding on this train was rough, especially when compared to when I was riding on the trains in Italy a couple of years ago.
I do not know how the seniors can do this, especially on repeated occasions, but I got to experience this once, and that was it for me. VIA Rail’s “The Canadian” felt like a test of endurance, and I was able to come out of the other side with an appreciation of how vast and varied Canada is. There is still so much to see in this country, but maybe stick to plane rides and a few more days in some of the cities.
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