For a long time I made YouTube videos. I enjoyed making YouTube videos. But then I stopped making YouTube videos. For many reasons. But mostly due to them not having a title sequence.
It’s clear that a Rocky Mountaineer train can’t set off from a station without someone standing on the platform waving goodbye to the passengers. Kamloops’s staffing levels however are a bit lower than Vancouvers, leaving just four people to stand and say goodbye to us as we leave the station for our second and final day of train travel as we head to Jasper. The train has also shrunk a bit overnight; several of the coaches and at least one engine have been left behind somewhere, presumably on a nearby railyard. From Kamloops the Rocky Mountaineer can go in one of two directions. Some trains head over the Canadian Pacific lines to Banff, but ours is going the other way to Jasper on the Canadian National line. It will take us into the Canadian Rockies proper. But first there’s breakfast to think of as the train crew work once more to put the pounds on their passengers.
"All aboard!" chorus the Rocky Mountaineer staff loudly as the train hoots in sync in a slightly cheesy way. Passengers are invited to make their way to their seats. The Rocky Mountaineer is getting ready to depart.
"One of the World's Ultimate Experiences" says the Lonely Planet about the Rocky Mountaineer. There's just the matter of the picket line to cross first.
With not long to go before a trip there, you can imagine my surprise and panic upon finding the terse message that 'This location has now closed' on the page for a YHA hostel in Greenhead we were booked in at.
On the way to Ireland we'd travelled by the World's Largest Car Ferry. The return vessel was to be just a bit smaller. And faster. For we were going on The Dublin Swift - Irish Ferries's fast ferry which knocks off an hour and a half off the journey time.