Geek Syndicate Issue 8 | Page 95

Geek Syndicate

Image © Laura-Jane Clements, 2013

A Town Called Vulcan

Me On Vulcan. In Vulcan. Vulcan, Canada...

with the same name as our beloved Spock’s home planet? It
was an adventure just waiting
to happen…
After a comfortable flight
and catching up with some
sleep in Calgary, we set off on

Image © Laura-Jane Clements, 2013

For those of you who may
not know, I’ve dedicated a
whole year to crossing off
as many items of geekery
off my Geek Adventure list
as possible. Items on the
list have ranged from creating my own superhero, going
Nessie hunting, spending
the night in a haunted house
and even meeting Joss Whedon (my personal favourite).
A few weeks ago I was lucky
enough to get on a plane and
head to a country I’ve never been to before in order to
cross another item off the list.

Number 24 – Visit the town
of Vulcan in Canada
Why was it on the list? Well,
what self-respecting Trekkie
wouldn’t want to visit a place

Welcome To Vulcan

the hour and a half’s drive to
Vulcan. Surrounded by vast
plains, the town seems to pop
up out of nowhere, and with
only 2,000 residents, it really
is a small place. The town was
named Vulcan after the god
of fire in 1910 by a surveyor
with a love of Roman mythology. Obviously, this was well
before we had ever heard of
Starfleet, the USS Enterprise or
the (actually never uttered in
an episode phrase) “Beam me
up, Scotty”. The town’s history
is steeped in agriculture but
over the years the residents
decided to embrace the very
thing that caused people to
stop and take their pictures
next to the town’s sign.
Nothing says “Welcome to
Vulcan” more than a replica Federation ship that they
have on entry into the town.
It was unveiled in 1995 and
has plaques around the base
written in English, Vulcan and
Klingon.
Talk about geeky
photo opportunities!
Once you have sufficiently exhausted your Star Trek poses,
the next stop would be the
Trek Station. Situated behind
the starship, it’s the perfect
place to stock up on your Trek
merchandise. If you are up
for a giggle, you should definitely take advantage of their
photo area. You can choose
uniforms from all different
Trek eras and pose with some
cardboard cut-outs of your
favourite characters. Or if you
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