CKGR-FM
CKGR-FM is a Canadian radio station that broadcasts on 106.3 MHz in Golden, British Columbia.
Owned and operated by Bell Media, the station airs an adult contemporary music format under the 106.3 EZ Rock on-air brand.
CKGR has also an AM rebroadcaster at 870 kHz in Invermere with the call sign CKIR.
History
In 1973, Hall-Gray Broadcasting Co. Ltd. (Bob Hall and Walter Gray) received a licence to operate a new AM station at Golden. CKGR signed on the air in 1974 at 1400 kHz. In 1984, CKGR received Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) approval to add a rebroadcaster at Invermere, operating at 870 kHz with the call sign CKIR.
Over the years, the station went through different ownerships. In October 2007, the assets of Standard Radio, including CKGR, were purchased by Astral Media, which is the current owner of CKGR.
Switch to FM
On October 15, 2010, CKGR received approval by the CRTC to convert to the FM band at 106.3 MHz with an average effective radiated power of 890 watts to broadcast a soft adult contemporary format targeting adults aged 18 to 54.
Central Kalahari Game Reserve
Central Kalahari Game Reserve is an extensive national park in the Kalahari desert of Botswana. Established in 1961 it covers an area of 52,800 km2 (about twice the size of Massachusetts, and 1/11 of Botswana's total land area) making it the second largest game reserve in the world.
The park contains wildlife such as South African giraffe, brown hyena, warthog, South African cheetah, Cape wild dog, African leopard, Transvaal lion, blue wildebeest, eland, gemsbok, kudu and red hartebeest. The land is mostly flat, and gently undulating covered with bush and grasses covering the sand dunes, and areas of larger trees. Many of the river valleys are fossilized with salt pans. Four fossilized rivers meander through the reserve including Deception Valley which began to form around 16,000 years ago.
The Bushmen, or San, have inhabited the lands for thousands of years since they roamed the area as nomadic hunters. However, since the mid-1990s the Botswana government has tried to relocate the Bushmen from the reserve, claiming they were a drain on financial resources despite revenues from tourism. In 1997, three quarters of the entire San population were relocated from the reserve, and in October 2005 the government had resumed the forced relocation into resettlement camps outside of the park leaving only about 250 permanent occupiers. In 2006 a Botswana court proclaimed the eviction illegal and affirmed the Bushmen's right to return to living in the reserve. However, as of 2015 most Bushmen are blocked from access to their traditional lands in the reserve. A nationwide ban on hunting made it illegal for the Bushmen to practice their traditional hunter-gatherer lifestyle, despite allowing private game ranches to provide hunting opportunities for tourists.
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