Calgary, cowboys and more music

FORT MacLEOD, AB -- I laid up in Calgary for three days with my friend Mark, a former Public Affairs Bureau colleague now working in corporate communications in Calgary. I fear the cold I picked up riding over the Coquihalla Summit in near-zero temps is only just starting to take hold. Achoo, snork!

The Heart of the New West, as it bills itself, Calgary used to be known as Cowtown and still hosts the Stampede, The Greatest Outdoor Show on Earth, every July. A lot of people, including suit-and-tie office workers and the city cops walking downtown beats, wear Stetsons (or cheaper versions of the iconic cowboy hat). But it’s oil and gas and getting it to market that drives the city these days.

Mark was a temporary bachelor with his wife Diana up in Edmonton, looking after her brother Richard, who suffered a horrible shattered leg skiing this winter. Mark caught me up on his new job.

We walked theiir dogs, Crosby and Oscar; hot-tubbed on their deck and one night, we went to a local club, The Blues Can, to hear some local acts showcase their stuff. Watch for DC and the Voodoos! Deja, our server who also fronts the band, did a killer version of the Brenda Lee hit Sweet Nothings.

I, in turn, told her about Calgary band The Co-Dependants and Billy Cowsill’s take on the song. At one time, Billy was in a band with family members and they became the inspiration for The Partridge Family, a huge TV success in the early ‘70s. Calgary bassist Tim Leacock is now a regular act at The Blues Can and was a member of The Co-Dependants and The Blue Shadows, both fronted by Billy until his untimely death in 2006.

Before leaving town, I met up with Mike, a freelance writer in Calgary. Mike and I worked together at the Sarnia Observer in the early ‘80s and recently reconnected on Facebook. I love Facebook for the revived friendships it's brought about.

I’ve always had a great deal of respect and admiration for folks who throw off the safety net of a regular paycheque for the often hard-scrabble uncertainty of selling words for money. Over pints, we caught up on a few folks we know.

Recently, the son of Terry, a mutual friend from those southwestern Ontario days, asked if his son could stay with Mindy and me while he looked for a job because Ontario is not hiring! As is common in Alberta these days, it doesn’t take much looking to find work and Brian is now happily living and working in his chosen field in Edmonton.

Another young guy who stayed with us for a bit last year was David, a freshly minted engineer from Aberdeen, Scotland who landed a great job in Calgary. His mother Kate and I worked together at the Tribune in Welland, where David was born, before they headed “away hame“ some years later. As a Canadian, it was easier for him than some to find work, but Alberta is where the jobs are in Canada these days.

Between the Rockies and the bald prairie lie the foothills and some of the most beautiful scenery Alberta has to offer. And it’s there, in the vast ranches and grazing ranges along AB Hwy. 22 where you’ll find the real cowboys. The Stetsons are not as crisp and clean as those in Calgary, the boots ain’t quite as shiny, the jeans are a little more faded and the belt buckles are as big as saucers! Not for nothing is 22 called Alberta’s Cowboy Trail.

After leaving the sprawl of suburban Calgary behind, I rode through towns like Black Diamond, named for the coal it shipped across Canada; Turner Valley, the birthplace of Alberta’s oil and gas industry; and Longview, where I stopped for lunch at the Little New York Bistro for what turned out to be the best BLT sandwich I maybe ever had.

Longview is home to Ian Tyson, a Canadian music legend, who penned the best Alberta song ever written and perhaps the best Canadian song ever written. Four Strong Winds closes every Edmonton Folk Music Festival and it is always amazing to see some of the best musical acts in the world singing it accompanied by 25,000 people gathered on the hill of Gallagher Park swaying, singing and holding their candles high. It’s my favourite thing about Edmonton, bar none. I’m truly sad that I won’t be there this year.

Turner Valley has a home-grown star, too. Amos Garrett played with Ian and his wife Sylvia in their band, the Great Speckled Bird. He also played with the Paul Butterfield Blues Band, and if you look closely, you can just catch a glimpse of a young Amos while Butterfield wows the crowd at Woodstock in the movie of the same name.

Amos is the musical director of the House Band that backs up the act a the Folk Festival and is always a treat to see and hear live. His version of Johnny and Santos’s Sleepwalk is my favourite guitar instrumental.

A quick side trip down AB Hwy. 7 brought me to Okotoks, literally "big rock" in the local Blackfoot language. glaciers literally dropped this huge rock in an otherwise flat field. Geologists call it an erratic. I felt a kinship in that regard with the big rock!

Rolling south after lunch, with the BMW‘s stereo blasting Stompin‘ Tom‘s Alberta Rose, I came across the historic Bar U Ranch National Historic Site. Sting, my friend, that is real synchronicity! 

As I took some photos from the roadside, an old fellow in a pickup truck stopped to ask if I was broke down and needed help. Mighty neighbourly, mighty neighbourly, as Corb Lund sings.

He volunteers every Wednesday at the ranch, working on donated farm implements and machinery. His favourite, he told me, is a 1946 Mercury pickup, first year Ford made a Merc truck. He also spoke wistfully of a ‘45 Harley he bought from army surplus after the Second World War. “Civilianized it,” he said. “Put some lights and a buddy seat on her, but still it was a hard old ride!” He said he rode a friend’s Honda Goldwing and it was almost too comfortable compared to the kidney-punching, spine-compressing ride of the Harley.

The cowboy trail meets AB Hwy. 3 about 20 minutes east of the Frank Slide. Hard to imagine a worse thing than 82 million tonnes of rock sliding off Turtle Mountain in the middle of the night and taking nearly a million lives and half the town in the process. It‘s still an eerie sight today.

Got into Fort MacLeod, originally a barracks town for  the North West Mounted Police, precursor to today’s Mounties. The Crowsnest Pass region must have been on Ian Tyson’s mind when he wrote Four Strong Winds. The unrelenting, howling winds really suck the enerrgy out of rider.

Folks here don’t really send their kids to school with pockets full of rocks to keep from being blown away, but they tell tourists they do!

I used to work for a cabinet minister who was also the local MLA. One day as we flew into MacLeod, the little four-seater aircraft was being flung about the sky by the ever-present howling west winds. Dave joked that a cabinet colleague with a tough-guy reputation, who shall remain nameless, was so scared by the landing in high winds, he was nearly tearing the armrest off his seat.. “See that flag,“ Dave told his fellow traveller, pointing to a shamefully tattered Maple Leaf at the local airport, “that was new when I took off this morning!“ I hope they've replaced that flag by now!

I've been in Timmy's way too long and now my little notebook is resisting commands to post pix. So, I'll get a move on and update this later.

I’m heading now to Letbridge this afternoon and on to Medicine Hat tonight. Then it will be farewell to Alberta for the second time on this odyssey. I’ve got the first 4,100 kilometers in and -- with the minor irritation of the final drive also in the rear-view mirror -- I have to agree with my buddy Mark! I really am having the adventure of a lifetime.

Please remember, I’m also riding for those who can’t. Please consider a donation to the Ride for Sight via my secure, online donation page here. Even a few bucks, pounds, euros, but not bitcoins, may help prevent someone like me or you from going blind.