GOING PLACES, NEAR & FAR.... Pursuit Collection Offers Feast for Senses and the Soul in Banff, Canada

Continued from previous page tray; crème brulee made with coffee, cookie crumble and white chocolate; and Pavlova made with white chocolate, whipped cream and blueberry. So culinary artistry that is also fun.

“There are no handcuffs on our chefs to develop recipes,” Chef Scott says. He challenges his chefs to try something they never had before, or, conversely, harken back to childhood. “We want the chefs to be intentional about their food creations, have a story, don’t just create a dish, always create with a twist.”

“Our secret advantage is that our staff comes from all over the world30 countries are represented. We listen to the flavors from their home.” He encourages his chefs to write a menu from their experience and their colleagues’ past. “Then it is about how they make it their own.”

About the Lions Mane mushrooms which I so enjoyed at Farm & Fire, he says, “Let the food do the work. No more than 5 points on plate.”

There are two special challenges Chef Scott faces: there are more than 60 restaurants within this tiny (walkable) town, and the strict sustainability rules of existing within a national park, especially in stocking the Sky Bistro atop Sulphur Mountain, reached by the Banff Gondola.

“The weight of a product is restricted in the park. We spent 60-70 hours looking at compostable cups. We look at sustainability when purchasing from suppliers. Food waste is composted. We recycle spent cooking oil for fuel. Everything that goes up the mountain has to come down. We have to keep track of the propane tanks.”

We get to experience Sky Bistro, quite literally “elevated dining” and not just for the spectacular view (from farm to summit,” Chef Scott says), along with the marvelous ride up the Banff Gondola and the whole series of experiences at the summit.

Rising up to 7,486 feet to the Sulphur Mountain summit, the Banff Gondola is Banff’s number one attraction for good reason. It’s not just the incomparable, breathtaking view of six stunning mountain ranges and the sweep of the Bow Valley from the summit, but the delightful eateries including the superb Sky Bistro, engaging exhibits, “Night Rising” (a creative sound-and-light happening), and for me, the chance to scamper down and up a half-mile long boardwalk along the peak to another peak to see the intriguingly named Cosmic Ray Station.

Justifiably winning the title “best rooftop restaurant in all of Canada” and the accolade, “dining sanctuary in the sky”, Sky Bistro is the most perfect place to dine as the sun is setting. The views are spectacular from the walls of windows inside, but I dash out to the observation areas. It is such perfection that I would bet there are marriage proposals just about every evening, as there is this evening.

The culinary experience pairs the grandeur of the Rocky Mountains with a distinctly Canadian menu that features the flavors of Canada through regionally sourced meats, produce and ingredients. (Check out the menu, https:// www.banffjaspercollection.com/dining/sky-bistro/our-menu/; also reserve in advance.)

At darkness, “Night Rise” takes over – a sound and light show that still is respectful of animals affected by light pollution as well as First Nations peoples who were the original inhabitants – so even the colors have to be appropriate, and it cuts off at a relatively early hour, 10 pm when the gondola closes.

There are igloos and fire pits, and sensors that make color and sound based on your own movement.

Mount Royal Hotel

Each day and night it is so pleasant to return to the Mount Royal Hotel.

One of the oldest hotels in Banff, a gold plaque outside the Mount Royal hotel says, “established in 1908. Re-imagined in 2018. Always at the heart of this community.”

The hotel was acquired by the Brewsters in 1912. It is delightfully situated so it is walking distance to absolutely everything (including the convenient buses to ski areas and that take you to Lake Louise, 45 minutes away, where private cars are not allowed and there are no lodgings).

The hotel cherishes its history, but actually, what guests experience is brand new from 2018. In the hotel’s museum we learn about the hotel had to be rebuilt twice due to fire – the most recent on Christmas 2016.

The 133-room hotel – its four-stories grandfathered in a town that limits buildings to three - was gut renovated in just 18 months after the fire (no casualties and the guests were immediately accommodated at Pursuit Collection’s other hotel, the 164-room Elk & Avenue; the damage was mainly from the water that froze instantly in minus 20 degree temperature.) First responders, including the man who would become Pursuit’s Executive Chef, Scott Hergott, spent six hours dousing the fire. Scott even went back into the structure to recover a guest’s ring.

We wander through each of the four wings of the hotel: the 1960s wing which was rebuilt after a 1967 fire by WG Milne (see some of those dramatic photos in the 2nd floor museum); a 1940s wing with works by Banff’s renowned cowboy artist Charlie Biel, who also did the

Colorful Diet for Your Eyes

BY CHARLYN FARGO

In a sports nutrition class I teach at the University of Illinois Springfield, the role of nutrition in helping athletes perform better goes undisputed. Nutrition is an important part of any top athlete’s training program.

A new study by researchers at the University of Georgia looked at how supplementing the diet of athletes with colorful fruits and vegetables could improve their visual range. Their paper was published in Exercise and Sport Sciences Reviews. It examined how a group of plant compounds that build up the retina of the eye work to improve eye health and functional vision.

Previously, researchers showed that eating foods such as dark, leafy greens or yellow and orange vegetables, which contain high levels of lutein and zeaxanthin, improved eye and brain health.

This new study, led by neuroscience doctoral student Jack Harth of the University of Georgia’s College of Public Health, looked at higher concentrations of the plant pigment’s ability to improve vision in the far visual range.

Visual range, or how well a person can see a target clearly over distance, is critical for top athletes in almost any sport, but especially baseball. Objects get harder to see and appear fuzzier the farther they are from our eyes because of blue light.

“From a center fielder’s perspective, if that ball’s coming up in the air, it will be seen against a background of bright blue sky, or against a gray background if it’s a cloudy day. Either way, the target relief outside the building.

The second floor has a delightful, roomy library, a small museum commemorating the Mount Royal’s history, and a place where coffee and tea are served in the morning. (You get an idea of what the Brewsters’ first livery transportation was like by the statuette in the lobby.)

The hotel’s 5th floor offers a lovely, expansive Cascade Lounge (opens at 10 am and at 4 pm serves beer, wine and cocktails), while outside are two hot tubs with gorgeous views of the mountain peaks.

The exterior of the hotel pays homage to its history and heritage, and as you walk along Banff Avenue, the town’s first street (designed in 1886 by Superintendent George Stewart), you see the original structures and enjoy the historic markers that preserve their story.

Befitting a town built on tourism, they really know how to cater to visitors – there are wonderful signs, markers, historic plaques (there are 48) and descriptions (there are 179 sites listed on its Inventory of Historic Resources including 25 Landmarks and Legends) that immerse you in the experience. They make it easy to get around. There is a free skiers bus. In summer, they turn the main street into a pedestrian mall. The surprise here is that Banff is also a real community.

Pursuit Collection, part of Viad Corp, is an attractions and hospitality company, that offers world-class attractions, distinctive lodges and engaging tours in national parks and renowned global travel locations, including a growing collection of FlyOver flight ride attractions in Vancouver, Reykjavik, Las Vegas, Chicago (expected opening 2024) and Toronto (expected opening 2024), pursuitcollection.com. To book Pursuit Collection’s Banff and Jasper experiences, https://www.banffjaspercollection. com/ is obscured by atmospheric interference coming into that path of the light,” wrote Harth in the paper.

Though lots of athletes wear sunglasses to make it easier, “eating more foods rich in lutein and zeaxanthin can improve the eye’s natural ability to handle blue light exposure,” said Harth. Lutein and zeaxanthin add yellow pigment to the retina, reducing the amount of blue light that enters the eye. Research in the 1980s showed that eating more lutein and zeaxanthin improved the visual range of pilots.

But it’s not just for athletes or pilots. Many of us would benefit from adding more color to our diet through fruits and vegetables to improve our eyesight. The

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Crossword Answers

BY THOMAS BRENNAN

In much the same manner as my early radio background enabled me to develop the listening skills to become entranced by the cadence of Vin Scully and Red Barber; I believe that comic books acted as a catalyst to my eventually becoming an avid reader.

A comic book gives the reader a drawn picture of a character speaking printed words, which I have always seen as a kind of training ground for making the more complex transition of using your own imagination to develop a mental picture of a central character drawn from a described event in a novel. In essence, comic book reading is not frivolous even as its purpose is simply to entertain. In time, from comic book reading, the young reader learns to develop the attention span to more readily enter into a novel’s well-developed plot in much the same manner as a comic book panel leads the reader deeper into a story line even if the central character is Donald Duck.

Most of us in our immediate area played street games; the arena was right in front of us as we walked out of our front door, but eventually, and at a very early age, quite a few of us entered into another part of the expansive venue of Prospect Heights: the children’s entrance of the Main Branch of the Brooklyn Public Library. It, too, was right around the corner. We did this as we did everything else, by ourselves. I know of no one who was first taken to the library by a concerned parent, even as I was often encouraged to visit by my father.

There was an advantage in having your local library have the distinction of being a “Main Branch” building located in an art-deco setting that was an integral part of the Grand Army Plaza background, even as the library’s more modern design broke from the Victorian Era architectural theme of the immediate area. Our library was not only bigger with its vast reserves of stored books far more extensive than the norm, but the inside layout was spacious and visually appealing. There was an added benefit that came from our recognizing the orderliness in how knowledge and information was structured and easily referenced.

The outside appearance of the library was simply magnificent and was intended to act as a beacon to draw people within its high vaulted main entrance doors.

Many of the books in the children’s section reflected the distinctive spirit of adventure that I have always felt