Category: Old Things

First posted in October 2014. Time has finally run out for Calgary Transit’s venerable fleet of MCI Classic buses and after some twenty plus years of service, they’re being retired. In the last while they’ve mostly served during peak hours only and the quantity on the road varied depending on...

This DNR Excavator is a strange metal leviathan and you can find it at Pioneer Acres in Irricana Alberta. The museum is a great place if you love old machinery and things of that nature. Of all the mechanical wonders in their expansive collection, this strange beast is perhaps the...

A BIGDoer.com repost from 2013. How many cities still have GMC Fishbowl buses in active service? Calgary Transit does! Most systems retired these venerable workhorses a while back and outside of odd stragglers in odd places, they’re nearly extinct. Except here it seems… The buses we’re documenting represent the very...

Here’s an old post from years back, pulled from the remains of a badly crashed archive, fixed up, edited and made new again. The photos show a Fairbanks Morse model H16-66 locomotive and it’s a rare beast indeed. Today it’s one of two left. It’s first seen in High River...

Trash receptacles like this were once a common sight along British Columbia’s provincial highways, at rest stops and parks. This army of cartoonish monsters were part of a campaign aimed at children to keep the province beautiful and litter free. That was long ago and they’re gone now, but this...

A chance encounter earns us a couple wonderful minutes getting to know the locomotives of 40 Mile Rail down in Southern Alberta. Trains are something we’re more into than our readers so normally not many pics like this are shared. Emphasis on normally. With such a spectacular setting we just...

Alberta Prairie Railway Excursions #41 is a century old steamer just recently returned to service after a lengthy absence and seen here in 2019 awaiting repairs. Based out of Stettler Alberta it powered tour trains full of happy folks down the scenic line to Big Valley and now it’s back....

Here’s some really cool roadside rust and this wheeled monster is an old log loader found in the remote mountain community of Beaton British Columbia. It’s a small settlement, so far off the map and hidden away that it might as well be on the moon. Not that it’s a...

Today we’re looking at Austin’s vintage heavy-hauling work truck, an early 1970s Kenworth W925 and approaching fifty years old it’s almost twice the age of its owner/operator. It’s seen here on standby for fire fighting duty and since the alarm could sound at any time, it’s kept prepped and ready...

The last train to Nakusp British Columbia was close to thirty five years ago and with that a chapter closed. The line into town remained in service just shy of a hundred years, so it wasn’t a total wash. As a memorial to this past, the wonderful folks at the...

Among collectors of classic vehicles there’s a fringe group that does things a little different. A little? Let’s label them crazy weirdos and leave it at that. There’s no ’57 Bel Airs for these folks, no T-Birds, no roided out muscle cars, but instead things called Fishbowls, Old Looks and...

Roaming industrial parks is our thing, as strange and bizarre as it seems. There’s always treasures to be found – old train tracks – character buildings – big trucks and while an edgy backdrop, it’s somehow compelling. In that theme, here’s a random discovery of curious tracked-vehicles on display in...

Imagine yourself sixty or seventy years ago and living somewhere on the expansive Canadian Plains. Think of a place remote and lonely. It’s winter and while there’s still a need to travel, the roads are blocked with drifts and anything with wheels useless till spring. A horse might do the...

General Motors once made transit buses and lots of them too. In the 1940s-1980s period they were a dominate player and at times appeared to literally own the market. Their “New Look” model is perhaps most iconic of all and we’ve chatted about them before at this website, but today...

The Reynolds Museum in Wetaskiwin Alberta is home some amazing vintage machinery and documented here it’s earth movers on a grand scale. These humongous beasts date back as much as a hundred years and came from a number of mines across the province. It’s historic diggers for the win! Put...

Historic buildings and vintage metal are equally a passion for us and this piece has both. Presenting historic Eamon’s Garage, a mid-century gas station at a small town museum and kindly showing up to pose in front, vintage rides belonging to members of the car club that own the building....

Peeking through the fence @ Calgary International we’re here to see some very specialized aircraft. Able to handle a number of demanding roles, it’s aerial firefighting which they excelled and where most were kept busy. Presenting the legendary Canadair CL-215, a unique design for a unique job. Whereas most “water...

Here’s a tour of two massive machines, along with all that remains of a third, that once worked at a Central Alberta coal mine. Look up, look waaaay up, they’re freaking huge! Wide angle lens are mandatory should you visit and if you’re not thoroughly impressed by their sheer size,...

Aimlessly cruising in search of something to photograph, it’s a target sighted. It’s a jet, an old Boeing 737-200, parked on the apron*, a plane in plain sight, just waiting for us to come by and snap a picture or two. We’re at the south end of Calgary International, the...