{"id":2374,"date":"2025-10-25T17:32:46","date_gmt":"2025-10-26T00:32:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maxvollmer.com\/?p=2374"},"modified":"2025-11-12T18:35:45","modified_gmt":"2025-11-13T02:35:45","slug":"trip-across-canada-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maxvollmer.com\/?p=2374","title":{"rendered":"Trip Across Canada, 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"

I made this trip by train on VIA Rail from Vancouver, BC, to Halifax, NS, to visit my son Karl.\u00a0 For the first two nights, I stayed in the Samsun Hostel in downtown Vancouver.\u00a0 It was affordable, efficiently laid out with individual rooms ( 4 or 8 beds), plus shower rooms and bathrooms on all four floors. Everything was kept very clean by staff and guests.\u00a0 Free, all-you-can-eat breakfast\u00a0 was a healthy mix of fresh fruits, cereals, and bagels with butter and jam.\u00a0 Staff provided the food, but guests bussed and washed all their own plates, bowls, cups, etc. in the kitchen area at the back of the main floor.\u00a0 [All photos \"copyright<\/a> Max Vollmer, Click on any image to enlarge]<\/p>\n

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Breakfast at Samsun Hostel<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I stayed in a 4-bed room and got a good night’s sleep both nights.\u00a0 Four metal lockers on rollers for personal belongings slid under the bottom bunks.\u00a0 Each bed also had a lamp and an outlet against its back wall to charge a phone, and a privacy curtain.\u00a0 While it was not supposed to happen, I ended up with a young woman for a roommate.\u00a0 Fortunately she wasn’t bothered.<\/p>\n

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My room.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I had a full day to explore a little of the downtown and to walk along the seawall to Stanley Park, a preserve with an old growth forest of cedars, firs and maples on a promontory\u00a0 west of the city center.<\/p>\n

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Downtown Vancouver high rise apartment buildings, with the seawall to the left.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Seawall and walking\/cycling path out to Stanley Park.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Path by giant Western red cedar.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Cedar, firs, ferns.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Vine maple.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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The Inukshuk, traditional welcoming sign of the Inuit people along the coast, created by native artist Alvin Kanak out of grey granite.\u00a0 The Inukshuk stands along the seawall facing the open sea.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I boarded the Canadian<\/strong>, VIA Rail’s premier scenic run from Vancouver, BC, to Toronto, Ontario, on Sunday afternoon, 10\/20.\u00a0 The entire train including my sleeper is vintage 1955, venerable but well maintained, with lots of solid stainless steel and aluminum trim and a few genuine leather details.\u00a0 I had my cabin, meant for two, to myself and appreciated the quiet comfort.<\/p>\n

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My room.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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My room with private bathroom.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Meals are included in the sleeper fare and are served in the dining car by reservation.\u00a0 Tables for four meant that I met people from Germany, France, and Japan.\u00a0 The real surprise was how many of my fellow passengers, couples and singles, young and old, were Canadians (the majority) and many of them French speaking.\u00a0 \u00a0Few were from the U.S. which was fine with me. Dinners included rack of lamb, beef tenderloin, and salmon, all excellent.<\/p>\n

I took advantage of the surprisingly roomy shower room at one end of the sleeping car each morning at around 6:00 a.m. and then took a seat in the dome car to watch the day begin before breakfast.<\/p>\n

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First morning. Cloe, French graduate student, on the right.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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The train follows the Fraser River to its source in the Canadian Rockies.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Our longest stop on day two was in Jasper, BC, a jumping off place for Jasper National Park.<\/p>\n

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Stopped in Jasper, BC.\u00a0 There were over a dozen cars, at least four of which were dome cars.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Happy traveler.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Jasper National Park does not disappoint and is the reason many people ride the Canadian.<\/p>\n

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East of Jasper.\u00a0 Jasper N.P.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Early snow.\u00a0 Jasper N.P.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Canadian Rockies.\u00a0 Jasper N.P.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Late afternoon, day 2.\u00a0 Jasper N.P.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The next morning dawned over the plains of Alberta and, yes, it is very flat.\u00a0 Saskatchewan is pretty much the same, perfect for growing wheat, barley, and oats for export.<\/p>\n

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Dawn over Alberta.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

By late afternoon on the third day, we were crossing the what’s know as the Canadian Shield, a region north of Lake Superior with the oldest exposed bedrock in the world.\u00a0 Something like 50 million years old.\u00a0 The climate is moderately wet and there were small bodies of water, like potholes, across the terrain all the way to Toronto, Ontario.\u00a0 From Toronto, I took a separate train to Montreal, Quebec, where I spent a day and two nights before boarding the VIA Rail Ocean<\/strong> to Halifax, NS.<\/p>\n

The Ocean\u00a0<\/strong>follows the St. Lawrence River through Quebec until it turns south into New Brunswick, the land of the Acadians.\u00a0 The story of Acadia and the 1755 Expulsion has not been forgotten locally.\u00a0 French and Acadian culture is still a big part of local life.\u00a0 \u00a0Homes in small communities along the river were uniformly well maintained and small by U.S. standards.<\/p>\n

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Along the St. Lawrence River.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Along the St. Lawrence River.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

When we turned south toward Halifax , we entered Mount Carleton Provincial Park and the forest was a mix of birch, eastern larch (bright yellow), spruce, pine, and fir.<\/p>\n

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Mount Carleton Provincial Park.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

My train ride ended in Halifax, three hours late which is typical of VIA Rail, where Karl picked me up.\u00a0 After eleven days traveling, I was more than ready for a hot shower and a long night’s sleep, a full four time zones away from Oregon.\u00a0 Karl’s house in Duncans Cove sits atop a rock face overlooking Halifax Harbor and is built on concrete footings set deep in solid granite and once held a shore battery to protect the harbor during WW I.\u00a0 Halifax and Dartmouth, NS, are on the horizon to the north.<\/p>\n

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View from Karl’s living room overlooking the entrance to Halifax Harbor. Lighthouse on the left.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I made this trip by train on VIA Rail from Vancouver, BC, to Halifax, NS, to visit my son Karl.\u00a0 For the first two nights, I stayed in the Samsun Hostel in downtown Vancouver.\u00a0 It was affordable, efficiently laid out with individual rooms ( 4 or 8 beds), plus shower rooms and bathrooms on all … Continue reading Trip Across Canada, 2025<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,71],"tags":[163,166,370,371,369,366,368,365,367,372],"class_list":["post-2374","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-journal","category-photography","tag-canada","tag-halifax-n-s","tag-inukshuk","tag-jasper-national-park","tag-montreal","tag-the-canadian","tag-toronto","tag-train-travel","tag-vancouver","tag-via-rail"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maxvollmer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2374","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maxvollmer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maxvollmer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maxvollmer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maxvollmer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2374"}],"version-history":[{"count":32,"href":"https:\/\/maxvollmer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2374\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2673,"href":"https:\/\/maxvollmer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2374\/revisions\/2673"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maxvollmer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2374"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maxvollmer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2374"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maxvollmer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2374"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}