landmarks and attractions in canada

7/30/2019 Landmarks and attractions in Canada

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Most interesting

attractions and landmarks in

Canada

Gatis Pvils, 14 February 2010

No.35. http://www.wondermondo.com/Canada.htmImage: Moraine Lake in Banff National Park.

Satoru Kikuchi, Flickr / CC BY 2.0
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The second largest country in world (by size) has plenty of landmarks and wonders to offer.

Nature of Canada is characterised with rugged, wast and

often snow covered and desolate landscape. In spite of

being one of the most advanced countries of the world

Canada is surprisingly little investigated and we may be

assured that there will be made exciting discoveries of

new impressive attractions in this country.

Mountain scenery of Western Canada provides some of

the most beautiful scenery in the world with such

beautiful scenic spots as the landscape around the

Moraine Lake. Meanwhile the immense space ofCanadian North provides such otherwordly scenery as

the unbelievable Mount Asgard.

Nahanni Second Canyon, the Gate. Wikimedia

Commons, Gierszep, public domain.

Mount Asgard Nunavut, Baffin Island. Impressivegranite formation, consisting of two flat-topped

cylindrical towers with abruptsides.

Dragon Cliffs Nunavut, Axel Heiberg Island. Veryimpressive flood basalt cliff rising several hundred

meters above the Expedition Fiord.

Headwall Canyon British Columbia, Toba Inlet. One

of most impressive and beautiful canyons with at least 15glacially fed waterfalls. The most impressive is FrancisFalls powerful, circa 580 600 meters high waterfall.

South Nahanni Canyons Northwest Territories.Extremely impressive canyons named consequently

First, Second, Third and Fourth Canyon. Haunted place

with true stories about the mysterious deaths of gold

prospectors.

Mount Thor Nunavut, Baffin Island. Granite cliffswith the possible highest vertical drop on Earth 1250

meters high, average angle 105 degrees.

Pingualuit crater.NASA, Wikimedia Commons, public domain.

Ungava Peninsula has a true natural wonder Pingualuit crater. This is one of most impressive

impact craters on Earth, possibly the most

impressive one.

Wondermondo is unique project: it aims to describe the most interesting man made and natural attractions /

landmarks in the whole world.

Author of website www.wondermondo.com and each article in it is Gatis Pvils. Visit the site to find a lot more

information!

Nahanni Second Canyon, the Gate.Wikimedia Commons, Gierszep, public domain.
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Castleguard cave and spring Alberta. Longest explored cave in Canada, 20,357 m long (in 2007). Theonly known cave with glacial plugs in back passages pushed in by icefield above the cave. Spectacular spring

emerging from this cave it is subterranean drain of Columbia icefield.

Vermilion Creek sinkhole Northwest Territories. Very impressive and enormous sinkhole.

Alfred Creek Falls British Columbia. Circa 700 meters tall and 30 meters wide fall droping off of theAlfred Glacier. One of the highest falls in North America.

Deserted River Falls British Columbia. Possibly the highest waterfall in North America, with 670 msingle drop and several more cascades possibly totalling up to 830 meters.

Francis Falls British Columbia. A powerful, approximately 650 metre high waterfall, belonging to a largergroup of very impressive waterfalls.

Helmcken Falls British Columbia. Beautiful, powerful waterfall, 141 m high vertical plunge. mediumwidth 23 meters.

Hunlen Falls British Columbia. A very picturesque and impressive waterfall, which leaves the lake in a 26metre wide stream and plunges 374 metres into a deep canyon.

Niagara Falls Ontario in Canada and New York in United States. The most popular waterfall in world is 51metres high and 1203 metres wide. The shape of the waterfall and its proportions have become synonymous

with the word waterfall.

Pissing Mare Falls Newfoundland. Highest falls in eastern North America, very impressive 350 metreshigh falls falling in freshwater fiord Western Brook Pond.

Reversing Falls New Brunswick. Series of rapids in the Saint John River. Here the river flows through

narrow gorge in the Bay of Fundy. Bay of Fundy has some of the highest tides in the world and this causesunusual phenomenon during the high tide water flows inland through the rapids, at low tide it flows back to

the sea.

Schwartzenbach Falls Nunavut, Baffin Island.These 520 metre falls (tallest single drop circa 200

metres) are special due to their location: they are

possibly the most remote and the most northern large

falls in world.

Skookumchuck Rapids British Columbia. Powerfulmarine rapids at the endrance of Sechelt Inlet. During

the tides the difference of seawater level can exceed 2

meters and seawater here flows with a speed up to 33

km/h.

Takakkaw Falls British Columbia. These are verybeautiful falls with a total height of 380 metres and the

highest drop at 260 metres.

Virginia Falls Northwest Territories. Last primeval large waterfall in North America. Here the powerfulSouth Nahanni falls 90 meters. Spire of rock Mason's Rock standing in the middle of falls.

Wapta Falls British Columbia. One of most powerful falls in Canada, Kicking Horse River here falls some30 metres high, width of waterfall 150 m.

Takakkaw Falls.brilang, Flickr / CC BY-SA 2.0


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Banff Springs Alberta. Nine sulphurous thermal springs, contain species of endemic freshwater snailPhysella johnsoni.

Liard River Hot Springs northern part of British Columbia. The hot water (42 52 C) of these powerful

springs helps to sustain the unusually rich biotope with many southern species that are unusual for this harshnorthern area.

Maligne Canyon springs Alberta. Karst springs of periodic changes in water quantity. In winter, whilepassing the water of Medicine Lake the output of 60 springs might exceed 65 m3 per second.

Rabitkettle Hotsprings Northwest Territories. Hot sulphuric springs, mineralised water has shaped thelargest tufa mounds in Canada up to 30 m high.

Dinosaur Provincial Park Alberta. Badlands in Red Deer River are world famous due to extremely richfinds of fossils, including more than 500 specimens of dinosaurs. Here have been found fossils of more than

500 extinct species of life. Important site also due to biodiversity values, including several species of cactus.

Joggins Fosil Cliffs Nova Scotia. This impressive coastal exposure of Pennsylvanian time has playedimportant role in the development of evolution theory and modern geology. Findings by Sir Charles Lyell put

basis for modern geology, information from the site have been used by Darwin and Huxley. Coal bearing cliffs

provide excellent fossils up to this day.

Miguasha Fossil Site Qubec. Unique deposits of Devonian fishes and plants, richest source ofinvestigations of Devonian period in the world.

Walcott Quarry British Columbia. One of most interesting and richest fossil finds in world. 505 millionyears old, Middle Cambrian black shale named Burgess Shale contains fossils of soft parts of extinct

animals. Tens of thousands of fossils have been found providing that rich scientific material which to large

extent has not been processed yet. Many fossils of unusual animals, for example with five eyes, or the unusual,nonsensical animalHallucigenia.

Big Rock (Okotoks Erratic) Alberta. Enormous glacial erratic weighing 15,000 tons, one of the largestknown glacial erratics in world.

Kicking Horse River Natural Bridge BritishColumbia. Impressive, beautiful limestone formation

natural bridge. Under the limestone bridge there

waterfall of the Kicking Horse River.

Manicouagan Crater Quebec. Enormous impactcrater, created some 228 million years ago by

approximately 5 km large asteroid hitting the Earth with

incredible speed 17 kilometres per second. Multiple

ring structure with 100 km diameter. Especially well

visible is the unusual ring-shaped Manicouagan

Reservoire with the second largest lake island of the

world in the middle Ren-Levasseur Island. Island for

most part is covered with old-growth forest.

Moraine Lake Alberta. One of most iconic scenicspots in the world, unusually blue colored lake with

surrounding extremely beautiful mountains mirrored in it.

Okotoks Big Rock.D'Arcy Norman, Flickr / CC BY 2.0


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Perc Rock Quebec. Unusual limestone stack small island with sheer cliffs with 15 metre high naturalarch near seaward end of island.

Pingualuit Crater(Chubb Crater) Quebec. Impressive, 3.44 km wide impact crater, 1.4million years old.Crater is filled with 267 m deep lake, one of the most transparent lakes in the world.

Athabasca Sand Dunes Saskatchewan. Unique geophysical feature largest inland sand dune massif inthe world, 100 kilometres long. Sand dunes reach up to 300 metres height. Contains 9 endemic plant species

what is unique for a location that far north.

Narcisse Snake Pits Manitoba. Location with unusual concentration of snakes. Here in limestone cavernsare wintering tens of thousands of Red-sided Garter Snakes (Hamnophis sirtalis parietalis). Mass gatherings

of these snakes can be observed in spring time.

Red Creek Fir British Columbia. Largest coast Douglas fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii var. menziesii(Mirb.)Franco) in the world. Trunk volume 349 m3, height 73.8 m, diameter 4.23 m.

Carmanah Giant British Columbia. One of the largest Sitka spruces (Picea sitchensis (Bong) Carr.), 95.7m high, diameter 3.66 m.

Even before the arrival of Europeans Canada was a

melting pot of very diverse cultures of First Nations and

Inuits. Notable contemporary monuments of pre-European cultures are the atmospheric Ninstints ofHaida people and contemporary megaliths inuksuitsof Inuit.

Short history of Europeans and other people in Canada

has left some very impressive monuments, including

long time record-holder of the tallest structure in the

world CN Tower or such Canadian speciality asCanada's grand railway hotels, such as ChteauFrontenac and Banff Springs Hotel.

Indigenous cultures of Canada have not left grand monuments of world importance but Canada is rich with

smaller, very diverse archaeological monuments which often have hard to explain peculiarities. Speciality of

Canadian archaeology is search of pre-Columbian European heritage.

Canada is rich with exposed rocks and indigenous cultures have left diverse array of rock art. Here are

mentioned just a few of the numerous rock art sites of Canada.

Chteau Frontenac, Quebec.Luke H. Gordon, Flickr / CC BY 2.0
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snaipi (Writing-on-Stone Provincial Park) Alberta. Here Milk River valley is flowing through

sandstone canyon with picturesque hoodoos. Park

contains 50 petroglyph sites with thousands of drawings

and is the most important petroglyph site in Great

Plains.

Mazinaw Lake pictographs Bon Echo ProvincialPark, Ontario. Up to 100 m high cliff rising from south-

eastern shore of Mazinaw Lake. Over 260 pictographs

rock paintings.

Petroglyph Provincial Park British Columbia. Sitewith numerous rock art monuments, includes cup and

ring marks.

Petroglyphs Provincial Park Ontario. The richestcollection of ancient petroglyphs in Ontario. Drawings

depict shamans, animals and possily the Great Spirit. Created possibly in 900 1400 AD, most likely by

Algonkian people.

L'Anse aux Meadows Newfoundland. Remnants of the only known village of pre-Columbian Europeansin America. Possibly established by Norse around 1003. Found remains of eight buildings. Site has traces of

additional five six occupation periods by native people.

Arnaud River Hammer of Thor Quebec. Unique archaeological monument 3.3 metres high stack ofthree stones, resembling an enormous hammer. Speculations that it has been erected by Vikings.

Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump Alberta. Unique monument of history up to 10 meters high and 300

meters wide sandstone cliff in the middle of plain. For approximately 5,500 years the site has been used byindigenous people in hunting they drove buffalo off the cliff, breaking the legs of animals and thus making

them helpless.

Majorville Medicine Wheel Alberta. Circa 5000 years old stone setting of unclear origin and meaning.In many respects resembles medicine wheel with a cairn in the middle. Site has rised discussions of scientists

about potential use of it for the worship of Sun.

Inuksuk Point (Enukso Point) Baffin Island,Nunavut. A group of over 100 vertical stone settings,

serving as navigation and reference points.

Ninstints (SGang Gwaay Llnaagay) British Columbia,Queen Charlotte Islands, Anthony Island. Largest

collection of Haida totem poles in existance, UNESCO

World Heritage site. Totem poles are located in their

original location, many are considered to be extremely

important works of art. Totem poles slowly disintegrate

and get overwhelmed by rainforest and thus are on the

border between contemporary and archaeological

monuments.

Mazinaw Lake pictographs.Pearl Vas, Flickr / CC BY 2.0

Inuksuit at Sandy Point, Nunavut.Mike Beauregard, Flickr / CC BY 2.0
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Cabbagetown in Toronto, Ontario is the largest area in North America covered with Victorian housing, builtin 1840ies. This neighborhood of Toronto has rich history of Canadian art scene.

Chinatown in Victoria, British Columbia. Second

oldest authentic Chinese quarter in North America afterSan Francisco (United States), developed since the

middle of 19th century.

Lunenburg Nova Scotia. Unique, well preservedBritish colonial settlement from the late 18th -19th

century. Numerous valuable wooden buildings shape

unique urban landscape.

Old Quebec Quebec. Former centre of French powerin North America, developed as city in 18th century. One

of the most authentic old towns in North America, once

enclosed by defense wall. Two gates and major part of

defensive wall still exist.

RSO (Underground City) Quebec, Montreal. Largestunderground city in the world, extending under the

downtown of Montreal. Contains 32 km of tunnels, area exceeds 12 km2, used by malls, metro, museums,

banks, condominiums etc.

Le Chteau FrontenacQuebec. Possibly the most impressive chteau style hotel in the world, built in1893. The most photographed hotel in the world.

The Fairmont Banff Springs HotelAlberta, Banff National Park. Enormous chteau style (called alsoScottish Baronial style) hotel, 15 floors high, built in 1888. Located in beautiful setting, with forest and snowy

mountains in the background.

Hartland Bridge New Brunswick. World's longestcovered bridge, 391 m long. Built in 1901, covered in

1922.

Lions Gate Bridge British Columbia, Vancouver.Landmark structure, one of the most impressive bridges

at time, built in 1938. Suspension bridge with 472 m

span, two 11 m high towers.

Myra Canyon Trestles British Columbia. Impressivemonument of railway construction 18 wooden trestles

for the railway crossing the impressive Myra Canyon,

completed in 1915. In 2003 lighting started a fire which

annihilated 12 trestles. Currently construction is

renewed.

CN Tower Ontario, Toronto. Communication and observation tower, 553.3 metres tall. This tower was the

tallest free-standing structure in the world in 1975 2007, it is popular visitor attraction.

Lunenburg in Nova Scotia.

Wikimedia Commons, Taxiarchos228, CC-BY-SA-3.0

Hartland bridge the longest covered bridge in theworld. Wikimedia Commons, Scott Davis, CC BY-SA

3.0.


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Montreal Olympic Stadium Quebec. World's tallest slanted structure and world's tallest stadium, iconicand visionary building constructed in 1976.

Hatley Castle British Columbia. One of the most impressive Gothic revival palaces in Northern America,built in 1908. Located in beautiful site with a view on Pacific and mountains. Intended residence of royal

British residence during the World War II. Impressive, interesting park.

Saint Joseph's Oratory Quebec, Montreal. Enormous basilica, built in 1924 1967. Third largest churchin the world by volume, height 129 m.

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