Historic & Heritage Sites
Heritage buildings (Picture BC photo)
Coal has been mined in the Sparwood area since 1899.
Sparwood celebrates its mining heritage with interpretive tours of the Elkview Open Pit Mine, and with walking tours that give visitors a glimpse into a darker past.
Elkview Mine Tours
Board the tour bus at the Visitor Centre for a one and a half hour tour of one of Canada's largest open pit coal mines. This guided tour begins with a short introduction to Sparwood's mining history, and culminates with a visit to a viewing station high above the Elkview Mine.
Gigantic Excavators
The vast scale of this mining operation is hard to imagine in advance. Down in the pit, shovels with a bucket capacity of 43cu m/56cu yd look like toys in a sandbox.
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Boys that play with Tonka Trucks would love this tour. But these gigantic machines are definitely not toys. Each of the excavators fills a 220-tonne dump truck in just three bucket loads.
Mining Process
The mining process is explained by a youthful tour guide reading from a prepared script. Tours are offered at 1pm on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. Reservations should be made not later than 1am at the Visitor Centre.
Murals and Mining Equipment
The Terex Titan is the dinosaur of Sparwood's open pit mine. It can accommodate two Greyhound buses and two full-sized pick-up trucks in its box, or two million golf balls, but was simply too expensive to operate. Now, the beast stands idle next to the Visitor Centre.
Sparwood Mining History Walking Tour
The truck is the largest of the dozen or so pieces of antique mining equipment on the Sparwood Mining History Walking Tour. Pick up a brochure about the self-guided tour from the Visitor Centre and learn how technology has made mining more efficient - and safe.
The murals, begun in 1989, portray scenes from the history of coal mining in nearby Natal and Michel, the early coke ovens and other aspects of Sparwood's mining heritage.
For more details on mining in the Sparwood area, contact the Visitor Centre, located just off Hwy 3.
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