Where was I (fictionally) today?

[whole diary]

[JayMac]

Discovered this impressive railway trestle bridge this evening whilst tracking and hunting several species of large mammals.

[Hal]

In Canada?

[JayMac]

In Canada?

Indeed. Care to guess which territory/province?

[Lee]

New Taunton?

[grahame]

Looks not mountainous enough ... but ... Highestbridges.com tells us

The largest conventional trestle railroad bridge ever built, the mile long Lethbridge Viaduct (94 meters high) opened in 1909 across the Oldman river in the southern Alberta province city of Lethbridge.

[Red Squirrel]

I've been cycling around Central Park (New York) quite a lot this last week, though today I was in Harrogate. All without leaving the dining room.

[eightonedee]

Back to BNM's pic - British Columbia?

[JayMac]

I was actually wrong about being in Canada. Bit further west...

[froome]

Alaska?

[grahame]

Alaska?

I suspected that ... but couldn't find anything suitable.  I was reminded (at around 14 minutes and 30 seconds into this video), the spectacular bridge on the White Pass and Yukon which Lisa and I saw in 2000 - bypassed by a loop that goes up the side valley, across at an easier point on a new bridge, then back down the other side ...

[JayMac]

Alaska?

Correct. In the Yukon Valley, Alaska. Hunting* Grizzlies, wolves, moose and caribou. On the Xbox game TheHunter: Call of the Wild. It's a fictionalised area of Alaska and the trestle bridge doesn't, as far as I know, match a real world one exactly.



*Not something I'd ever do in real life. Just like I wouldn't shoot cops or drive like a maniac as I do in Grand Theft Auto.

[stuving]

It's a fictionalised area of Alaska and the trestle bridge doesn't, as far as I know, match a real world one exactly.

Leaving aside the philosophical question of whether something imagined and drawn, that doesn't exist in reality, can be "in the Yukon Valley, Alaska" ...

It does look quite unlike any (real) one I've seen in how narrow the supports are. They splay out very little towards their base, which just looks wrong to me. I suspect they'd be a bit bendy, swaying to and from, which would be rather scary. And there's a stability issue as well - too much sway and its own weight will start to start to pull it over. Finally, and most seriously, the narrow bases are much less strong against an overturning moment.

[Oxonhutch]

Correct. In the Yukon Valley, Alaska. Hunting* Grizzlies, wolves, moose and caribou. On the Xbox game TheHunter: Call of the Wild. It's a fictionalised area of Alaska and the trestle bridge doesn't, as far as I know, match a real world one exactly.

I worked two field seasons in Alaska as a field geologist and have to admit that bears caused me more angst than the 'Big Five' did from my 18 years in the Southern African bush before that. There I met a lady geologist from the Alaskan Geological Survey who bore the most horrendous scars from being eaten alive by a brown bear before she managed to dispatch it with the pistol in her backpack. That she was back in the Alaskan wilderness - alone, continuing her profession, says a lot about her strength and stamina.

The annual safety gathering in the Lower 48 loosing-off all sorts of firearms before first going there I have to admit was the most entertaining event I have ever undertaken in the name of safety. Despite the target tin can receiving a number of near misses, I decided that for me, bear spray was safer.