The Transit Hotel

I was in Edmonton in February (which seems like years ago now) to see the Ice Castles and happened to be staying on the north side, which worked out pretty well for a couple buildings that I wanted to see. A friend also mentioned the Transit Hotel, which was also close to my location so off I went! I love it when things work out like that.

The Transit Hotel or just 'The Transit', opened in September 1908. It was built at a strategic location that was the start, or finish, of the journey between Edmonton and Fort Saskatchewan. It is located on Fort Road which was the Fort Trail back then. This area was known as Packingtown due to its concentration of stockyards and packing plants. The new hotel boasted hot and cold water, bathrooms on the top floor, a telephone call system and electricity. A barbershop was even planned to open in the basement. The packing plants and stockyards are now long gone.

According to an article in the Edmonton Journal, not much remains of the original interior or exterior. Bob and Pauline Ruzycki bought the run-down hotel in the 80's spent a lot of time and money to restore the facade to its original boom-town architecture. This included the 2nd floor veranda, parapet and finialed roof line. Bob passed away in 2012 and his son Daryn ran the place until it closed in June 2017.  Patrons remember it not being a rough place since everyone knew everyone, however I bet this place has some stories!! If you know this place or have heard stories, please let me know.

Some old neon!

Then and Now c1912-13 to 2020 

c1912-13 courtesy of the Glenbow Archives

c1967-72 courtesy of the Provicial Archives of Alberta

How's everyone coping with the isolation? We are doing OK here, the days seem to go by fast enough. I am working from home which helps and the school has been giving assignments, so the kiddo has some school work to do to. Which I think is great! Take care out there and stay inside!

Ice Castles

Ok...so 2020 is not the year of blogging more often. I don't know what it is the year of yet other than the year of not much free time. C'est la vie!

Photos and exploring have not been happening much but we did get away for a night...destination Edmonton, Alberta to see the Ice Castles. Edmonton is only 1.5 hours north of where we live but still it was a nice overnight 'staycation'.

If you go to https://icecastles.com/ you'll see there are only 6 of these particular Ice Castle attractions (did they trademark the name?) in North American, and only 1 of those is in Canada. Why they chose Edmonton...who knows, but lucky for us they did. (Being from Calgary, we naturally have a friendly rivalry with Edmonton. Go Flames Go.)

Even though it was crazy busy and I couldn't take any kind of photo that shows the scope of this frozen attraction, I did get a few photos that don't do this place justice but do show how colourful and unique it is.

The lights were always changing making it really fun to watch. There was big tunnels and narrow tunnels where you had to back up to let someone by, there was little kid sized tunnels that I wouldn't go in. I would feel like Steve McQueen in The Great Escape, Arctic version. There was also ice slides, sculptures and entertainment. We watched the fire dancers and there was fireworks every half hour or so too. Outside the ice castles was another event with snow sculptures, skating and music. It was worth the trip!!

The next day we visited the Alberta Aviation Museum and enjoyed that as well. All in all a good trip to Edmonton.

Thanks for reading this far everyone! I am catching up on my blog reading and can't wait to see what I have missed!