The Road Home

At every opportunity we take the back roads. That’s where the good stuff is. Even if in familiar territory, there always seems to be a surprise waiting for us around some corner when using this approach. It could be something new we missed before or a place known to us that on seeing again inspires fresh possibilities. The fun never ends. In this post we take in two small towns east of Calgary we’ve visited before (and suspect we will again), Arrowwood and Gleichen. This day was magic with Mother Nature serving up a most spectacular sunset.

Arrowwood was founded in the mid-1920s, with the coming of the railway (CPR). That line was pulled up sometime in the early 2000s, although a section a bit to the west remains in place for the Aspen Crossing Tour Trains (an epic experience BTW). The town’s current population hovers around two hundred. It’s farming and the oil and gas industries that employ most. It’s a sleepy little burg and we saw not a single soul, nor even a passing vehicle, as we wandered about. Doing it, Omega Man style.

The grain elevator seen is the last in town. There used to be many others down here by the tracks (or where the tracks were). This is a late model “prairie sentinel” that dates from the ’70s, once belonging to the Alberta Wheat Pool. The company colours are a dead giveaway. Back before the great elevator purge of the 1990s/early 2000s, this firm had one (or more) of these in nearly every town that had rail service in the province (so a lot). They were traditionally the biggest grain firm in Alberta. The building is now owned privately and is used for grain storage.

Here’s a couple views of Arrowwood’s elevator row in the 1990s: Arrowwood Alberta – Then and Now.

In behind the elevator it’s a couple friendly horses. They were not happy till we paid them some attention. Ohh, a good scratch and a pat on the head!

On the main street (called Centre), a strange thing that’s little seen these days, an old school phone booth. Picked it up and got a dial tone. It works! These are getting as rare as the grain elevators we so actively search out. Doing a one-eighty, we look at the remains of the lumber yard connected to the Co-op, which recently moved to a new location in town. The shuttering of downtown businesses like this is a pattern that’s repeated time and again out in rural Alberta, but here at least the firm didn’t completely abandon their home market. They just moved.

With the light still in our favour, we rush to Gleichen not that far away. The town goes back to the 1880s, and sprung to life concurrent with the arrival of the Canadian Pacific Railway’s transcontinental line. This was and is a busy section of track. Sadly no train passed while we visited, however. Damn. The town has a population of just over three hundred, although many more folks, some four thousand or so, live on the Siksika Nation south across the tracks. It’s large reserve that extends half way to Arrowwood.

Of interest this evening, and looking fabulous in the soft light, it’s the town’s library. The building is from the 1910s (it’s believed) and was once a Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce. That firm built similar looking structures in many small towns across the prairies. They made them nice back then. There’s many other vintage structures that deserve our attention in Gleichen, and we think a revisit is in order. We always leave stuff behind so we have an excuse to come back.

And last, a stop to see something we’ve been meaning to shoot for a long time. At the Wheatland County offices, out on the Trans-Canada, there’s an old school metal spiral slide one might find in a circa-1950s/1960s playground out on display there. Well there was…it’s since disappeared. It stood there for years and when we finally decided to stop to see it up close, it’s gonzo. There’s a lesson here.

The slide was nothing spectacular, just something we hoped would takes us back to our childhood. It’s memories of a simpler time, with no worries and nothing to do but play, and there in lies the attraction. It’s about being a kid. We remember slides like it…and those swings with the pinchy chains, the pukey-go-round, the steel rocking horse and the “launch your friend” teeter-totter. No soft foamy plastics then, but hard metal and wood (splinters in your bum) and danger at every turn! And yet miraculously we all survived.

So all we have to shoot here now is this sign. Oh well. Soon after it’s full on dark.

Then it’s Calgary bound. On the road home, so much cool stuff seen and photographed and in everything we do, this endless adventure. That’s our approach to life and it seems to keep us in good shape.

They’re saying…

”Love your postings, please keep it up.” Candy Belliveau.

Arrowwood & Gleichen have cool water towers!
Blame Bachusky – and now it’s a new obsession.

Small towns!
A Few Minutes in Granum.
Onarc.
Hello Blackie.

If you wish more information on what you’ve seen here, by all means contact us!

Date of Adventure: April, 2019.
Location: Arrowwood & Gleichen, AB.
Article thanks: Connie, for picking this road.

In Arrowwood Alberta.

Come say hi!

There used to many other elevators here.

Phone booths are becoming a rarity.

Remains of the Co-op which left town recently.

Down by the tracks in Gleichen.

A former bank, now the town’s library.

The metal spiral slide is gone!