IN THIS EMAIL:
- Read about the importance of passenger rail corridors and what it means for Canada if we continue to pull up tracks. - Our biweekly Wildlife Wednesday! Beavers, polar bears, sharks and more. - Discover more about Canada Post's newest distribution warehouse honouring Toronto's first Black letter carrier - Ready for your next adventure? Take a look at Klahoose Wilderness Resort's adventure in the heart of Desolation Sound. |
| Losing track: The importance of passenger rail corridors What does it mean for Canada if we continue to pull up train tracks?
By Tim Querengesser with illustrations by Marc Audet
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Sean Marshall could sense the end approaching. “I had a feeling it wasn’t long for this world,” Marshall says of the passenger train on Vancouver Island. It was 2005. Marshall took what he felt was a fleeting chance to ride Via Rail’s Dayliner service from downtown Victoria to Courtenay. He had already travelled by train the 4,000 kilometres from his home in Toronto to Vancouver. The trip was part of his fulfillment of a desire to ride Canada’s transcontinental rail network while he still could.
Who could blame Marshall, now a writer who documents Canada’s passenger rail network, for sensing what he did? His 2005 trip was in a Budd rail diesel car — a one-car, 70-passenger, self-propelled train-meets-bus hybrid designed in the 1930s. Via Rail to this day uses Budd cars (which can also be linked together to form a longer train) in northern Ontario to maintain threadbare passenger rail services. |
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A polar bear keeps close to her young along the Beaufort Sea coast in Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. (Photo: Susanne Miller/USFWS [CC BY 2.0 DEED])
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| Avian flu — responsible for the death of millions of poultry birds in Canada alone — has killed a polar bear for the first time on record.
The polar bear was part of the already threatened Alaska population, and was found dead in the North Slope region sometime in the fall of 2023. The cause of death was confirmed as avian fly on Dec. 6 by the Alaska’s Division of Environmental health.
While this was the first polar bear avian flu case, there have been reports of other animals infected by the virus in Alaska, including red foxes, a black bear and a brown bear. The polar bear likely contracted the flu after eating a dead bird, according to Alaska state veterinarian Dr. Robert Gerlach. |
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| | Inside the distribution warehouse. (Photo: Andrew Williamson Photography)
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As befits a state-of-the-art distribution warehouse, Canada Post’s vast new Albert Jackson Processing Centre, which opened this past fall in Scarborough, Ont., delivers a collection of breathtaking metrics: the $470-million plant is larger than six CFL football fields, contains eight kilometres of conveyer belts, has 155 loading bays and can handle a million parcels a day. It also has enough rooftop solar panels and internal electric vehicles that it’s a net-zero industrial building, the largest of its kind in Canada.
Given that it’s twice the size of Canada Post’s previous largest hub, the most remarkable detail is that a package can arrive, get processed and be ready for shipping in just four minutes. But while the massive new processing facility was built with an eye to Canada Post’s future, its name is an acknowledgement of the institution’s past. Albert Jackson, who was born in Delaware in 1857, became Canada’s first Black letter carrier, although attaining that position meant pushing back against the racist views of the postal workers of his era. |
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Canadian Geographic Adventures
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| | Immerse yourself in the heart of Desolation Sound, located in the northern Salish Sea in beautiful British Columbia, Canada. The Canadian Geographic Adventures Discover Klahoose package offers four nights accommodation in lodge rooms or cabins, all with private facilities and spectacular ocean views. |
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The enrichment program will feature our RCGS Travel Ambassador sharing their specific expertise as well as Klahoose’s own local Cultural Interpreter who will assist in guiding a 4-5 hour boat tour exploring Desolation Sound and Toba Inlet. Immerse yourself amongst local culture through Indigenous storytelling, cedar weaving, kayaking, stand up paddle boarding, ocean swimming, forest walks and ocean foraging.
Prepare to be transformed as you discover the magic of Klahoose in Desolation Sound.
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