Not club or ham related, but a fun local event not to be missed: The CP Holiday Train will visit Maple Ridge (across from the Billy Miner Pub) on Monday, December 17th at 1930 hours. A second stop in Pitt Meadows (Harris Road and Advent Road) will occur at 2045 hrs.
Entertainment on this years’ train will be the Sam Roberts Band, Kelly Prescott and Sierry Noble.
Some interesting facts about the train:
- There are actually TWO CP Holiday trains.
- One train visits stops in the United States, as far south as Kansas City.
- The first train departs Montreal November 25, and goes to Quebec City then south to the US. The train travels westward across the US and eventually back northward, ending its journey near Moose Jaw, SK.
- The train that visits Maple Ridge starts its journey on November 27, also in Montreal. That train travels north to Sudbury, passing to the north of the great lakes, then westward across the Prairies.
- The CP Holiday Train has been making its journey since 1999.
- The train has raised $14.5 million and 4.3 million pounds of food for North American food banks. Everything donated in each community stays in that community. CP also makes donations in each stop.
- The CP Holiday Train is approximately 1,000 feet long.
- The hundreds of thousands of LED lights are always lit throughout the train’s entire journey, with one exception: when the train crosses the border and passes through Customs.
- When the train reaches Maple Ridge, it will have been travelling for 20 days. It’s three-week journey ends the following day in Port Coquitlam.
- The trains are pulled by GP20C 2200 series locomotives that are two-thousand horsepower each.
- Each locomotive weights 275,000 pounds.