I am in Toronto wrapping up my trip. I’m not going to lie. When I was talking to staff on the way off the train at station I felt like tearing up. The last bit into Toronto was like the long goodbye with people–one by one–reluctantly saying goodbye to the people they got to know on the train. But more on that later.

I’m writing this on January 21, officially the last day of the trip. I fly back to Boston today from Toronto, but I have wifi now, so I’m going to try to catch up and finish this Canada trip blog over the weekend in chronological order.

I plan to to do three posts inlcuding this one. Here, I will focus on the first day back on the train. The next post will be about the two days on the train in the Canadian Prairie. Then the third will be about coming into and leaving the train.

I woke up early on January 17, ready to spend some time packing my suitcase for ease of use on the train. I am going to be in the same type of cabin, but I didn’t really want to have to go digging around to get everything. I would need very few changes of clothes because the people on this train are not fancy.

Just as I planned, I walked the Bear Paw Bakery to get something for breakfast. As you can see, it is a 4-minute walk from The Crimson.

It was a beautiful morning, and I’ll remember Jasper for being the sunniest place I visited the entire trip.

The Bear Paw Bakery actually has two locations, but the original is the one that is the closest to the hotel. I had looked up their menu before going and had decided what I was going to get, but of course when confronted with the actual selections, I went overboard!

It is a lovely spot, and while there, I regretted saying I wouldn’t be sad about not being able to visit Jasper again once I saw all the pastries I would never get to try. I’d like to go to the other one, literally called The Other Bear Paw Bakery, and see if there is much difference. As you can see everything looks delicious.

I bought a raspberry danish and a bear claw w/o raisins for breakfast. I also bought something for lunch because I remembered how the train from Vancouver was late the last time, so I figured I would get something to eat for lunch at the station in case it was late again. If it was later, I would miss lunch on the train.

Once again, Fresh Tracks Canada had the same outfit, Sundog Tours, pick me up from the hotel to take me to the train. I was embarassed because the train station is within walking distance of the hotel, but the driver just laughed it off.

We had plenty of time to sit in the station. Check in was at 11:30, and the train wasn’t leaving until 12:30. I was glad because I hadn’t had the opportunity to even go inside the station when I arrived. It’s small but quite cozy, and the prettiest of the small stations I would see on this trip.

Inside:

Outside:

This is also where I got to see a bit of how long the train I was getting on was.

When we checked in, we were told that since the train was on time, we would be able to have lunch as soon as we boarded, but that the only seating times left for dinner was the second seating because the train was pretty full. I knew I wasn’t going to make it until a 7:30 seating, so I resolved to eat lunch and save the lunch I bought for dinner in my room.

Lunch was the same lunch that I was able to get when I came in to Jasper at the beginning of the trip, and I got the pot pie again. Gravy was different, but I just picked out the mushrooms, and it was fine. In fact, I think I enjoyed it more because I was hungrier this time. The last time, I had had that big omlette for breakfast, and with the time change we had lunch an hour early. I was pretty full at that lunch, so the enjoyment wasn’t the same as this time.

I sat with a tall, scruffy uni student (who will be named uni student for the rest of this blog since I never remembered his name), an older man named Sheldon, and a silent, on-his-phone-the-entire time 20-something who only spoke to us when he got up to leave. I never saw him in the dining car again for the rest of the trip, but I did see him several times in the game room car and never not looking at his phone. I wonder if he rides the train often. He seemed really uncomfortable with other people.

There was a large group on the train who were getting off in Edmonton. It was bittersweet hearing them speak Korean. When I heard them, I wished I was on this trip a couple of years ago because then I would have been able to talk to them. I didn’t bother trying this time. Even though I understood enough to know who the leader of the group was and that he was tired from trying to herd the group along, I don’t remember enough Korean to talk to any of them. Sigh. Another work regret that I need to remedy in the future.

Train career reflection #1: How do I get back to the things I really liked doing?

My professional coach, Adam, told me that I should use this downtime to really think about who I want to be going forward. He even suggested that I think of different ways to introduce myself at these meals to think about what I want to be known for going forward. It was a very interesting exercise. Someday, I might write about that more.

It’s too fresh now.

After lunch, I went back to room to get a bit more settled in. I took some pictures from there and then in dome car, wanting to get some pictures of the mountains again before leaving Jasper and the environs as we went east and north to Edmonton.

Dome car pictures: I wasnt’ sure how many more pictures of mountains I should take or post, but since I knew we were leaving the Canadian Rockies . . .

I wasn’t planning on going to dinner being so full from lunch and the fairly big breakfast I ate. I was very happy to have the porter take down my bed early, brush my teeth and get settled in.

I was so proud of myself because the night before at The Crimson, I had looked up some more books I could get from amazon to add to my kindle library on my Surface. Not only that, but several of them were free if I signed up for a 30-day trial with the Kindle app. Score for me! I was worried because I knew I would finish the book Kiana had gifted me by the end of that day, so I got more books to read.

You should imagine my excitement, and then my disappointment when I actually opened up the folder only to see them all listed but not downloaded!! I thought I had downloaded them when I got the notice that they had been “added.” Nope. Those two ideas are not the same thing.

There is very little service on the train. Never enough to download anything. In fact, during this trip will be the first time I actually saw “no service” on my cell phone. Not just no wifi but no cellular service either.

Thus, yours truly with that bed you see above, stayed dressed, making a note to myself that I needed to get off the train in Edmonton because they would have wifi in the train station to download the books.

I had my pretzel pizza and the carton of milk that I had bought for lunch for dinner, and I’m glad that I let them talk me into getting it.

I read some of the book that I had and then around 7PM, we arrived in Edmonton.

I’m going to be honest. I was ready to be completely intimidated by the Edmonton train station because I grew up during the Gretzsky hockey era, and the Edmonton Oilers were this behemoth that could not be stopped. If the train station had looked like something out of the Death Star, I wouldn’t have been surprised. However, it was an ordinary small station.

I did notice that it had the most security of any of the stations, though. I sat and downloaded my books. I had to wait for the official (re)boarding to get back on the train. They had a security person who checked our bags. I felt a bit bad for him because in front of me were a bunch of young teenage girls (maybe median age was 14?) who were clearly best friends and SUPER excited about whereever it was they were going.

I’m not sure he wanted to see what was packed in their backpacks though they were not hestitant to show him. So much giggling. I’d forgotten how much giggling there is when a pack of young girls gets together. I just smiled because they were so clearly enjoying each other. Those were fun times.

I couldn’t get into my pajamas fast enough. I snuggled up in my room and read until a fell asleep, being rocked into it by the train.