They say that life is about the journey and not the destination.  However, we live in an age where everything runs so fast that there's little time to even notice the flowers, let alone stop and smell them.  While VIA Rail Canada is on the cutting edge of rail travel today, it has its routes firmly ensconced in history.  VIA's pedigree harkens to a more civilized day where travel was celebrated rather than tolerated.  Where dining meant something much more than a pack of peanuts and the air you breathed was fresh, clean and not canned in an aluminum tube.

This month, I thought I'd give you a greater appreciation of where the great rail line came from.  As you read this remember - nostalgia sells - so don't keep this glorious past to yourself!

Milestones

In the late 18^th and early 19^th century, wooden rails were installed on slopes so that cable cars could haul merchandise uphill. One such notable system was built at Cap Diamant in Québec City to help construct the Citadel, the largest fortification in North America.

World. On September 27, the world's first real railroad line officially opened in England. It connected Stockton to Darlington, near Newcastle. Distance: 19 km.

Near Kingsey Falls, Québec, eccentric merchant James George used wooden rails to connect a logging site to the Saint François River six kilometres away. Horse-drawn carts hauled logs along the tracks.

During construction of the Rideau Canal in the Ottawa area, wooden rails were used to haul stones between a quarry at Hog's Back and Nepean.

The 202 km long Rideau Canal connects the Ottawa River in Ottawa to Lake Ontario in Kingston. The plan to build this key component of a second line of communication between Montréal and Kingston for military purposes dates back to the end of the War of 1812. Some 50 locks were needed to control water levels at rapids along the Rideau and Cataraqui rivers.

Canada's first industrial railway opened near Pictou, Nova Scotia.

World. The world's first public railway opened between Liverpool and Manchester, England. Distance: 51 km. It was really the combination of railway tracks, steam engines and regular schedules that marked the birth of the railway as a modern means of transportation.

Canada's first public railway between Saint Jean sur Richelieu and La Prairie, Québec was opened by the Champlain & St. Lawrence Railroad. Trade and transportation were also greatly improved by the linking of Montréal to the Hudson River Valley and New York via the Richelieu River and Lake Champlain.

In the mid 19^th century, Canada's roads were not very developed and navigable waterways were frozen up to five months a year. The Champlain & St. Lawrence Railroad, financed by Montréal merchants such as John Molson, served as a portage road between Montréal and Lake Champlain. But not much freight was carried. The train travelled on wooden rails protected by iron straps.

The Grand Trunk Railway Company was founded in Montréal. For several decades it was the biggest business in Canada.

The first Grand Trunk trains began running between Montréal and Portland, Maine, whose harbour was open year round. It was the first crossborder railway in North America.

Trains began running between Montréal and Toronto. In Point St. Charles, southwest of Old Montréal, Grand Trunk built Canada's largest railway shops, which hired over 2,000 workers.

In August, Queen Victoria's son Albert Edward, Prince of Wales and heir to the British throne, officially opened Victoria Bridge, an architectural masterpiece designed by engineer Robert Stephenson. Montréal Island could finally be reached by train.

July 1 brought Confederation. Under the agreement, the only two Maritime provinces at the time, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, were promised railway connections to Québec and Ontario.

Some 10,000 Métis, mostly French speaking Catholics, were now living on a large stretch of fertile land along the Red River. But the federal government began colonizing the area with English speaking settlers from Ontario, without regard for the ancestral rights of the Métis and Amerindians. This angered the Métis, who formed a provisional government headed by Louis Riel.

On July 15, Manitoba joined Confederation and became Canada's fifth province. But the Métis crisis still simmered. Ottawa refused to recognize Louis Riel's provincial government and forced him into exile. In the years that followed, the Métis received support from Western tribes also threatened by colonization. But the combined forces of the Métis and Amerindians were no match for the better armed soldiers carried westward by rail.

British Columbia now joined Confederation, but with a condition attached: a transcontinental railway had to be built within 10 years to connect it to Eastern Canada.

Grand Trunk modified its railway to meet American standards. The wheels and suspension systems on its 3,000 cars were replaced, 150 more locomotives were built, and 800 more cars added to the fleet. During the night of October 4, 1,510 workers changed the gauge of 1,474 kilometres of track.

The sparkling new 1,100-km-long Intercolonial Railway opened, connecting Nova Scotia and New Brunswick to Québec and Ontario.

The Canadian Pacific Railway Company was founded in Montréal by a group of businessmen of Scottish descent: Donald Smith, George Stephen and Richard Bladworth Angus.

On July 24, Rogers Pass, which would be used to cross the Rockies and Selkirk Range, was discovered. Fatal avalanches in the 1,330-metre-high pass convinced Canadian Pacific to build the 8 km long Connaught Tunnel in 1916.

Grand Trunk merged with Great Western Railway based in Hamilton, Ontario.

Canadian Pacific began building its own steam locomotives and then its own cars. The company became the second transcontinental passenger train operator after the Pullman Company of Chicago, Illinois.

The first train crossed Canada from Dalhousie Station in Montréal to Port Moody, 20 kilometres from the small town of Granville, which eventually became Vancouver. The following year brought construction of the first railway station in Vancouver, which quickly became Western Canada's main seaport.

The Grand Trunk Pacific Railway was founded, connecting Winnipeg, Manitoba to Prince Rupert, British Columbia. This put it into competition with two other transcontinental railways: Canadian Pacific and Canadian Northern.

On August 18, at a special session of the House of Commons, the Conservative and Liberal parties agreed in principle on Canada's entry into World War I.

The railway boom drove many companies to the brink of bankruptcy. The federal government nationalized them and created Canadian National. In a series of moves from 1916 to 1923, Ottawa took control of Grand Trunk Pacific, Canadian Northern and Grand Trunk, and merged them with Intercolonial and National Transcontinental, which were already nationalized, to create Canadian National Railways (CNR), now known as Canadian National (CN).

On September 3, England and France declared war on Germany. Canada joined them a week later, over two years before the United States. As it had during the previous Great War, Pier 21 in Halifax served as a gateway for soldiers, and also for the European immigrants who poured into Canada during and after the war. From there, they boarded trains to various destinations across the country.

In the wake of World War II, passenger train travel declined throughout North America as people opted for cars and airplanes.

Launch of the Turbo Train with its turbine engine built by Pratt & Whitney (United Aircraft) in Longueuil. It looked futuristic but was withdrawn from service in 1981 because of countless mechanical problems, and replaced by LRC (light, rapid, comfortable) trains.

With Canadian National and Canadian Pacific gradually cutting down their passenger service since the 1960's, the federal government decided to create VIA Rail along the lines of Amtrak, founded by the American government six years earlier.

France's first high speed train (TGV) began running between Paris and Lyon. It reached a top speed of 260 km/h, which was later boosted to 270 and then 300 km/h.

The SNCF (Société nationale des chemins de fer français) launched the Eurostar, which connects Paris and London in three hours through the Channel Tunnel (under the English Channel).

CN became a private company. On November 17, trading in its shares began at the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol CNI and at the Toronto Stock Exchange under the symbol CNR.

In November, Amtrak's first high speed train, the Acela, began travelling between Washington, DC and New York City in two hours and 26 minutes. Later, this American train would also connect New York City to Boston, and exceed speeds of 225 km/h.

A North American first, VIA Rail made Wi-Fi (wireless Internet access) service available to its passengers.