26 September 2025 – Not for the first time. and especially not for the first time in fall, I stop at the W 41st & Oak Street entrance to the VanDusen Botanical Garden, and wriggle happily at the colour contrasts.

Citrus yellows! Deep furry greens! Deep glossy greens!

And, while I’m wriggling, how about the reds palette in that shrub?

Leaves toss in the breeze, proving even their undersides have their own blushing story to tell, a subtle counterpoint to all that show-off stuff on top.

We meet, my friend and I, and start walking later than intended — but for irresistible reasons.

We get talking with a Calgary couple who decided to celebrate their 43rd wedding anniversary in take-a-trip style. Conversation ranges from where they live in Calgary (since friend & I each have Calgary histories); to what colour is the most fun to dye your hair (Calgary woman’s daughter once had hair that glowed in ultra-violet light, great for nightclubs); to their anticipation of the free cart tours the VanDusen offers people whose enthusiasm outpaces their legs.

They await their cart. We veer off to the right, my favourite VanDusen walks almost always starting on the floating bridge through the Roy R. Forster Cypress Pond. After that, one path leads to another and choice doesn’t much matter, because they’re all worth walking.

Colours definitely now on the shift. Shapes also, as leaves fall and seed pods develop, and more sculptural lines emerge.

A whole dazzle of yellows, up in the sunflower beds.

Yellow-yellow…

and yellow-yellow with tawny-orange colleagues farther back…

and then a reminder that the range on display is not only colour, but height as well.

Giants gravely bend their heads, as if to inspect these tiny humans down below…

while bees (count ’em, two) prove…

they can visit any height they want.

Time out to take souvenir photos for some visiting Peruvians.

“¡Queso!” I cry; “¡Queso!” they chorus back at me, all of us laughing that “cheese” works equally well in both languages, to evoke a smile for the camera.

A pearly shimmer, in path and seed heads, among all the shades of green…

and then we spend yet more time walking up and around the grounds before looping back down again.

Still happy with whatever path our feet happen to discover, and still discovering more plays of colour, in this annual seasonal dance.

Greens falling away, in deciduous trees…

allowing all those yellows/golds/oranges/reds to have their moment. All that, against the quiet majesty of coniferous dark green.

And then… look!

a coyote.

And farther down the path…

an owl.

Still farther…

another winsome coyote, one paw raised.

I later discover they (and more, in this harvest celebration) are works by Burnaby BC artist Nickie Lewis, whose eco-creatures I first saw in a Burnaby park back in 2021. (When we all badly needed charm and delight, in our pandemic-hedged lives.)

We re-meet the Calgary couple, who can’t rave enough about their cart tour of the Garden. They’re now off to a slap-up expensive lunch in the serious restaurant — that anniversary deserves every tribute they can offer it — and we head, equally cheerful, for the café.

What with both Calgary and those twig coyotes built into my day, it’s perhaps inevitable that I now start reminiscing about Coyote Pancake Mix. It’s an Alberta brand I discovered in my Calgary years, its image the silhouette of a coyote and its slogan (wait for it): “a howling success.”

Quite possibly, all this means more to me than to my friend — oh, you think? — but she is generous in her friendly attention. We enter the café, well pleased with our day.

You might even call it a howling success.