With crisp, clear air and earlier sunsets, autumn is prime time for stargazing and to learn about the night sky through an Indigenous lens.
“The moon and the stars give us guidance,” says Lilyrose Meyers, a Knowledge Holder and traditional workshop teacher at Métis Crossing, a cultural gathering centre and vacation lodge on the banks of the North Saskatchewan River near Smoky Lake, Alta. “We have a connection with all people on Earth through the night sky.”
Read on to learn more about Indigenous-led stargazing and night-sky experiences happening through the fall and winter at Métis Crossing and other locations around the province.
The Language of the Mountains
At the summit of Sulphur Mountain overlooking the town of Banff, the night is rising.
Nightrise is an immersive multimedia winter exhibit created by Montreal-based Moment Factory in partnership with the Stoney Nakoda Nation and presented by the Banff Gondola, an attraction in the portfolio of international tourism company Pursuit. The exhibit includes four digital art installations with soundscapes featuring the Stoney language and traditional drumming. “It’s a winter storytelling immersive experience,” says Cherith Mark, Nightrise’s Stoney language translation co-ordinator and Stoney language narrator.
It’s Mark’s voice that visitors hear when they arrive: “âba wathtech” (good day). “This is an opportunity to hear the language of the Stoney Nakoda people, who have been in this area since time immemorial. It’s a part of the landscape,” Mark explains. “Hearing my language echoing in the mountains, my heart feels overjoyed … You hear the traditional songs of the Stoney Nakoda as the sun goes down and Nightrise begins.”
Nightrise takes place both indoors and outdoors on multiple levels of the gondola’s Upper Terminal building. The rooftop terrace features displays of interactive lights, as well as the opportunity to listen to a traditional story, while the 360-degree observation deck, with warming firepits, is one of the best spots for stargazing in all of Banff National Park.
banffjaspercollection.com/attractions/banff-gondola/
Snowshoeing Under the Stars
Located in the foothills near Sundre, Alta., Painted Warriors offers year-round outdoor experiences from an Indigenous perspective. The ranch is run by co-owners and partners Tracey Klettl, who is of Cree and Mohawk heritage, and Tim Mearns, who is of Ojibwe heritage.
The Guiding Lights of Our Ancestors tour is an evening snowshoe excursion that includes a meal cooked over an open fire. During the small-group guided snowshoe walk, guests are encouraged to stop, turn off their headlamps and gaze up at the the night sky. “It’s about that really deep connection,” says Klettl, whose Cree grandmother taught her about their family’s connection to the land and the skills they needed to navigate through their lives. “I always like to have people stop and think about our ancestors and the lives they would have lived. We needed to understand nature and what it was telling us to survive. The stars were our calendar and our time clock, and we used them as a map to navigate our way.”
Painted Warriors also offers an all-inclusive Moonlight Tour snowshoe package that includes a two-night stay in a cozy log cabin warmed by a wood-burning stove.
Stars and Stories
The stars are brilliant in the night sky at Métis Crossing, located within the Otipemsiwak District 12 and Treaty 6 territory (Smoky Lake County), an hour and a half’s drive northeast of Edmonton. “It looks like the sky is alive,” says Natasha Donahue, a Métis educator and manager of Indigenous Initiatives at Telus World of Science in Edmonton and a researcher with the Galileo Project at Harvard University.
Métis Crossing’s Whispers from the Stars interpretive program, developed in partnership with Telus World of Science, explores Indigenous Peoples’ relationship to the skies. According to Donohue, who helped create the program and appears occasionally as a guest presenter at Métis Crossing, the Cree people call the North Star the “going home” star, because they could always rely on it to help them navigate the way back home, while the constellation known to settlers as the Little Dipper is Atima Atchakosuk — the Dog Star (not to be confused with Sirius, named by the ancient Greeks, which is in the constellation Canis Major).
Donohue learned the story of Atima Atchakosuk from Knowledge Holder Wilfred Buck, who told her the constellation represents three animals: fox, coyote and wolf, and that it explains, in part, how dogs came to have a relationship with humans. “They gave us their puppies,” Donahue says. “They are the ones who gifted us with dogs, to protect and take care of us.”
Along with upscale lodge accommodations, Métis Crossing has luxury sky-watching domes that allow guests to gaze at the stars all night long. A single dome sleeps two, while the family domes sleep six to nine. Métis Crossing also serves Indigenous-inspired cuisine under the direction of internationally trained executive chef, Michael Levy.
Jasper’s Dark Skies
When it comes to stargazing in the mountains Jasper is in a class of its own. In 2011, the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada officially designated Jasper National Park a Dark Sky Preserve — an area committed to reducing light polution and protecting the night sky. It is the second-largest Dark Sky Preserve in the world and the largest that encompasses a town. Taking place annually in the fall, the Jasper Dark Sky Festival celebrates the night sky with programming that includes guest speakers, telescope viewings and cultural events like a series of fireside chats hosted by an Indigenous Knowledge Keeper. At press time, the catastrophic wildfires of this past summer meant the fate of the 2024 festival was unclear. What is clear, is that when things start up again, Jasper will need visitor support more than ever. Visit jasper.travel for up-to-date information on the status of events in the region. —Shelley Arnusch
Go Further
The night skies in Canada’s northern regions are legendary, but, this season, stargazing tourism will no doubt be seeing heightened interest after the Northwest Territories was named one of the “best places to go in North America and the Caribbean in 2024” by the influential publication, Condé Nast Traveler. Located on the Ingraham Trail near Yellowknife, Indigenous-owned Aurora Village is world-renowned for its sky-watching experiences that include heated swivel seating and tipi accommodations on the shores of a private lake.
