Saturday reflections

Here's one from last summer in Calgary -- I like those bits of sky in the windows.

Urban poetry

This made me smile -- the Petropolitan, an animal day care in Calgary. I think playing with other people's dogs all day long is a job I could really enjoy.

Saturday reflections

The Galleria Trees in Calgary made wonderful reflections.

I'm sure they're doing their best to blunt the winter winds coming off the prairies, but all things considered, I'd just as soon be in New York this time of year.

Saturday reflections

Another treasure from the In Progress folder -- the Bow Building in Calgary (location of this interesting sculpture). The curved front reflects multiple images of the In Progress building across the street.

Urban poetry

Colorful seating in downtown Calgary.

A few comments about hotels

I've stayed in all kinds of hotels all around the world, including some real dives, so maybe that's why I'm not as demanding as some of the travelers I know. I want a reasonably quiet room with a clean bathroom, a comfy bed, and coffee available in the morning. I am appreciative of warm cookies delivered to my door, but I don't require them. I've had surprisingly bad rooms in allegedly very good hotels, and surprisingly good rooms in hotels where I didn't expect to be impressed.

That's the lobby of the Chateau Lake Louise on the left. This is the sort of hotel that you can only describe as grand -- more than 500 rooms, more than 100 years old. The hallways and grounds are bustling. The service is impeccable without being snooty. And the room I had, though very comfortable, did show its age. The bathroom was almost as small as the one in my apartment, and they made up for the lack of outlets by providing power strips under the desk and next to the bed.

It also had a view of the lake.

The artsy picture of rumpled bedclothes on the right is from my hotel in downtown Calgary, which could not have been more different -- small and very, very modern. (Not modern enough to actually have outlets by the bed, however. Or by the desk. I had to charge my phone in the bathroom.)

And I never did figure out how to turn on the reading lights over the bed, and I went over every inch of them multiple times. I am considered to be a reasonably intelligent person, and they just baffled me. I finally gave up only because I could imagine all too well getting sleepy over my book and then not being able to turn the damn thing off and having to go to sleep with a pillow over my face.

Saturday reflections

One more walkway in Calgary -- I love the way the reflection captures that house-shaped detail so perfectly.

Old and new

One of the things I really enjoyed in the part of Calgary where I was staying was the old buildings that still existed on almost every block, with the modern office towers as a contrasting backdrop.

These buildings that used to be banks and fire departments and meeting halls are now restaurants and gyms and car rental locations, but I loved that the old buildings remained, old and new mixed together in a way you rarely see.

Urban poetry

The Calgary Stampede had ended the day before I arrived, but there were still lots of men wearing cowboy hats on the streets of Calgary.

Which I did not expect. Between all the oil and energy companies, restaurants specializing in Alberta beef, and country music playing in the Hudson's Bay department store, Calgary is a little like a smaller, cleaner, much more polite -- and Northern -- version of Dallas.

Public art

The sculpture on the left is called Wonderland. It was created by Jaume Plensa, the artist who created the Crown Fountain in Millennium Park in Chicago.

And the shapes on the right aren't really a sculpture. They're called the Galleria Trees, and they are meant to keep the pedestrian street in downtown Calgary from turning into a wind tunnel.

Walkways

A few quick looks at Calgary before I pack my bags and head for home.

The first thing you notice about downtown are these walkways, allowing you to cross the street without going outside. There's one on almost every block, sometimes more than one, and while they're mostly utilitarian glass tubes, some of them are quite fancy.

Ian and Sylvia (by way of Neil Young) told me that the winds sure can blow cold way out there, and here's architectural evidence.