Calgary Audio Tours

Calgary sits on the prairie at the edge of the world, or at least it feels that way when you look west and see the Rocky Mountains sixty miles out, sharp and sudden against the flat horizon. The city was a NWMP fort in 1876 and a ranching town in 1884 and an oil city after Leduc No. 1 came in 1947 and changed everything. By the 1960s Calgary had more millionaires per capita than anywhere in Canada. The skyline that resulted, taller and shinier than any other city this far from an ocean, is the direct consequence: a downtown of glass towers that went up fast and without apology, connected by the Plus 15 elevated walkway system so that office workers never have to face a January morning at street level if they can help it.

The Calgary Stampede, launched in 1912 by American trick roper Guy Weadick with funding from four local businessmen who put up $100,000, calls itself the greatest outdoor show on earth and does not particularly undersell the case.

For ten days every July, the city genuinely does transform: cowboy hats appear on otherwise suit-wearing financial executives, chuck wagon races fill the Stampede grounds, and the rodeo competitions are taken with complete seriousness. In 1988, Calgary hosted the Winter Olympics and built infrastructure that the city still uses, including the Olympic Oval on the University of Calgary campus, known as the fastest ice on earth.