My new job often takes me to different cities and towns in the interior British Columbia. One such trip was to a city called Nelson in the Kootenays region of BC. Nelson, a city of 10,000 is the cultural hub of the Kootenays. Boasting of an impressive collection of heritage buildings it is the kind of city I love to visit. I was going to spend a couple of days here. Mostly working during the day I found a way to spend my evenings exploring the city.
My first day of the trip started with me and a colleague's drive from Kelowna to Nelson. On the way we stopped at Grand Forks and only reached Nelson around 4pm. Immediately after checking in the Hotel I made my way out into the streets. Our hotel was located right at the end of the most happening street in Nelson, called Baker street. I strolled along the whole stretch of the street till the very end. Nelson, true to its 'hippie' image features a lot of boutique and offbeat stores. I was soaking in all this hippie 'vibe' when suddenly out of nowhere I heard the hugely popular Telugu song 'cheliya cheliye' play out somewhere. Turns out there was a big store selling Indian products and they were playing this song on the loudspeakers. I casually walked inside the store and had a nice little chat with the cashier about Nelson. Later, I aimlessly wandered around the streets here just going where my heart led me and by the time it was 8pm I had covered the downtown area and the river side area. This whole part is beautiful with some pretty old buildings and shop fronts. This was a delight for me as I love old buildings. I called it a day by 9pm and made my way back to the Hotel.
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| The City Hall in Grand Forks |
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| Random streets in Nelson |
Next day threw up an unexpected surprise. For our work we had to go to the nearby town called Kaslo. Now from my previous googling about the region I know that Kaslo, apart from being very pretty, was also home to a very important landmark. Kaslo houses the SS Moyie sternwheeler. A National Historic Site of Canada, SS Moyie is the oldest intact sternwheeler in the world. Somehow in between my work I made sure to check it out and took a few pics. It looked magnificent sitting at the waterfront near the row of pretty shops.
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| The main street of Kaslo |
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| SS Moyie |
We were back in Nelson by 5pm and this time I went in the opposite direction to where I went the previous day. I badly wanted to check out the railway station here and made my way to the quaint station. There was not a soul there so I strolled around the deserted area and finally sat down near the tracks. A locomotive was shunting far away and railfans know how dreamy is the sound of a locomotive shunting in a lonely area. I sat there for sometime lost in thoughts with the sound of the locomotive shunting taking me back to my travels in India. After my reverie was broke my a slight drizzle I quickly got up and left the station. I still had one place to check out and even though it was drizzling now I was determined to check it out. I had heard of a tram operating in Nelson and knowing the late hour I knew it was not operational at that time but I still wanted to just take a look at the tracks and maybe take a pic at one of the tram stations. Which is exactly what I did. There is a lot of history behind it but suffice to say that a volunteer group called the Nelson Electric Tramway Society still operates one section of the tram line along the waterfront. After this mission accomplished I made my way back, still in that drizzle, back to my Hotel. The next way we departed for Kelowna. Overall, even though it was a work trip, I made the most of it and it turned out to be a hit both workwise and my travel wise.
