We drove Irene up to Toronto this afternoon to join Catherine at the Royal York. They are departing in the morning for the west coast on the Via Canadian. This train travels between Toronto and Vancouver, crossing the picturesque lakelands of northern Ontario, the western plains and the splendid Rockies, finishing its journey on the Pacific coast. Other stops include Sudbury Junction, Winnipeg, Saskatoon, Edmonton, Jasper and Kamloops. They will be traveling Silver and Blue class with a double bedroom sleeper compartment. I’m sure Irene will have a blast. Continue reading link for pictures.
Check out the menus 
Going West then the returning East menu
Hope mom and Martha returned safely home. It was a very good trip for both of us. Thanks so much Martha for the professional job packing everything necessary, and nothing superfluous. It will be interesting to see how the pictures turned out. We were not great photographers; but we did manage to get the film roll in each camera finished. The food was delicious, the porters were kind, the scenery exquisite, and the company was good.
Mom had no trouble with food. There was a slice of spice cake that I thought was being attacked a little too ferociously one evening, but nothing serious (just recognition of a delicious taste). All other food, including meat, mom was very careful to chew well. No choking whatsoever. And the meals really were delicious.
I brought 2 large-print novels along. Mom finished both and liked them both. I was glad to see that she could see well enough to read them. And she talked about the story in them, so I know she read them and understood them. I read A-M MacDonald’s The Way the Crow Flies. It was the perfect book for the trip.
So we read a lot, talked, and just spent time together. The night we left Vanc 8 hours late, mom and I had woken up EARLY so that mom could walk o the Dome Car when no-one else was walking around. Supper that night was served at about 10:30 PM. That was after a morning on the train, a tour of Vanc and an 8 hr wait at the Vanc train station. That was the night mom and I giggled so hard we almost peed our pants. They served our dinner in the room in defference to mom’s expected fatigue. I Had a problem setting the table back up after I moved it for mom to get in. I couldn’t get te thing to clamp into te wall properly, and all the knives and forks and napkins fell on the floor. We couldn’t stop laughing, but finally, before the porter came back with the food, everything was back the way it should have been.
Every meal we sat with different people. Mom used the Wahington chair to get to the dining room; and used it as a chair while she ate. We met a lot of Americans, some people from Quebec and Montreal, from Dawson City and from Britain. It was nice because no-one sat with the same people twice; yet, because you passed familiar faces in the aisles, people became more and more friendly as the trip continued.
I’m still in Toronto, and everything looks very spacious.
Thanks for getting mom to Toronto and back home again. It made all the difference.
Love,
Catherine
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