DAY TRIP: Kananaskis Field Station

By Alan Cho

The barbed wire fence and machine guns have been replaced with goats and pine trees that now decorate this picturesque mountain landscape. KFS hasn’t always been this friendly field station. Back in WWII, it served as an internment camp for German and Italian prisoners of wars and before that, it was a slave camp. But don’t let that put a damper on your day if you plan on going out to visit. No more soldiers with hollow eyes and orphaned children here, just a beautiful educational facility specializing in ecosystem studies dealing with the Canadian Rockies and Foothills area. Students interested in global change, biological diversity or sustainable ecological systems can take field trips courses at the two facilities that make up the KFS, the Barrier Lake Station and the R.B. Miller Station. If none of those interest you, KFS is a great place for midnight skinny-dipping. It also has the tastiest food for a field station.