Changes will send chills through municipal councils and create a lot of grief for MLAs  It has been very interesting to watch over the past week how Premier  Danielle Smith ’s United Conservative Party government has unrolled its suite of changes to municipal governance and local election laws, and ...

This is the sequel to Poetry in the Snow , from February 9, 2024. Next day we skied  to the alpine and came across fresh grizzly tracks. One of the things I enjoyed about snow camping was the comforting thought that all the bears were tucked up snugly in their dens and I could get a good night's sle...

I was driving on a snowy Maligne Road a number of years ago—one of those crisp winter days that make you glad you live in Jasper—when I spied a set of wolf tracks crossing the road. I stopped for a better look, and I had just crouched down to look at the tracks when I heard howling nearby. In my min...

The sky was mauve, a pale bluish purple. A colour you only see in winter. Mauve, the colour of cold. This was the night the temperature was forecast to hit minus 30 degrees Celsius.  As we struggled up from the valley the forecast seemed spot on.     I caught the smell of woodsmoke and figured our b...

August 31. A blue moon tonight, the second full moon of the month. The weather is not looking good. As I trudge up the summit slope cloud sweeps in as if sucked by a vacuum cleaner. One moment I have a view, the next I'm in a whiteout and flakes of snow splatter on the rocks. I don't know why the he...

Moose are huge! With a dark-brown body, super long legs, large head with an elongated nose, generous lips and big ears...there is just no mistaking a moose.   Males (or bulls) can weigh up to 600 kilograms (1,300 pounds) and grow a heavy set of antlers every year which are shed after the mating seas...

On Remembrance Day, look at the old veterans gathered at your local cenotaph, standing proudly, or seated with a warm blanket on their lap. Try to imagine what they experienced many decades ago when they were young, and the world was at war. The great invasion to kick the Nazis out of France took pl...

The Dunning-Kruger effect is that sensation among overconfident newcomers that they have incredible natural abilities, mere moments after learning a new skill. That inflated confidence has been termed “Mount Stupid” that is quickly followed by the “Valley of Despair” once reality makes an appearance...

Gregory is dead. Long live Gregory Guest columnist: Joe Urie To those peacock provocateurs, Jasper’s Joe Urie asks: Where is the outrage for the national park’s native species that are destroyed every year? “News is history shot on the wing. The huntsmen from the Fourth Estate seek to bag only the p...