So, the reason for my trip to Canada – my brother’s wedding. Although we’d spoken on the phone, I met the bride for the first time when I arrived in Calgary. My brother picked me up from the airport and we met up with his fiancee at a restaurant and had a bite to eat before going back to their house and examining the photo album my youngest sister and I had put together. By the time we got to bed – 11pm Canadian time, 6am the next day for me – I was beyond tired! The following day we took some supplies out to Camp Chief Hector in Kananaskis country at the foot of the Canadian Rockies where the wedding would take place two days later. 
A gorgeous venue, wooden cabins dotted in amongst the trees and a large wooden main building – Bowfort Lodge – where the reception would be held. Then I spent the rest of the day back in Calgary, reading on their balcony (and catching up on sleep) while they organised more trips to camp with linen, glassware, alcohol and all the paraphernalia needed for a wedding.
On Friday, we set off again, collecting my niece on the way, this time for three days. The family – both sides – would be staying over on Friday too, in order to help set up, and then it was expected that most of the guests would stay over in cabins on Saturday night, after the wedding. More like Sunday morning as it turned out. We stayed in the cabin used normally as the medical centre – or so it said on the board placed outside – but also known as the Big House. Plenty of room for all the family – the bride’s siblings and families and me and and my niece. After setting up the tables ready for
the wedding, we all ate together in Bowfort before returning to the Big House, a couple of km down the road. Just up a slight incline and along a wooded path from Bowfort, was the cabin (the oldest at Camp Chief Hector) where the ceremony would take place the following day. We had seen earlier in the day how it had been given a bit of a facelift! That night when we left Bowfort it was pitch dark, plenty of cloud cover, so no stars, so dark you couldn’t see the person in front of you. We had been told that there was a cougar around, so hurried to where we thought the car was. Apparently cougars attack from behind, so you don’t see them coming, but we all reached our beds unscathed.
So, the wedding itself: a bit of a rainy day, but nothing could spoil the magic: the piper, the kilts, the white, black, grey and shell pink of the dresses, the gorgeous venue, the white, black, silver tables with pink flowers at the reception – it was all just beautiful. The old cabin where the ceremony took place looked amazing: beautiful polished wood floors and panelling, a huge stone fireplace, tall candles, flowers – and a piper to lead the bride and her party through the trees to the cabin. The bride’s youngest sister was matron-of-honour, her children were ring-bearer and flower girl, my niece was bridesmaid and I was best man. Yes, really, speech and all.
What makes a good wedding? Well, if you’d asked the guests they would have said: the lovely couple, the beautiful ceremony, the piper, the wonderful venue, the food, more food, the beautifully set tables and fairy lights and sparkling glassware, the ambience, the humour (speeches, people, incidents…), the music, more food, lots to drink, fun people and lots and lots of dancing….for hours on end. 
Well, this was the best wedding I’d been to for many, many years. And judging from comments I heard all evening and the next day, lots of people felt the same.
The dancing came to an end at about 1am, with most people still up on the dance floor. Slowly we made our way to our cabins and the newly married couple to a yurt which had been decorated by the bride’s friends: mosquito netting draped above the bed which was placed in the centre of the space, tea lights (the battery sort, not flame – you never know with yurts) and rose petals. As we got out of our cars at the Big House, we ignored the fact there was a cougar on the loose, and stood and gazed at the stars. A cloudless night, a sky that was truly peppered with stars, a fantastic view of the milkiness of the Milky Way and at least three shooting stars. A wonderful end to a beautiful day.
Patamateria 