I see a lot of different sides to this issue. Living in the same area as gem, I understand her point. I think there are kinky people everywhere, no matter how conservative the general population is (and yes, Alberta is very conservative), but you need a certain amount of population density before you can reach a critical mass.

I don't think that people who aren't Canadian, or who have never travelled to Canada understand just how spread out our population is. We have about 1.5 times the land mass of the US (roughly, off the top of my head... feel free to actually look it up and correct me) and only 1/10th of the population. "Major centres" are relatively few, and extremely far between.... and although we consider the likes of Toronto and Vancouver to be huge metropolises, they pale in comparison to the size of other major cities in the US and around the world.

So when you are trying to seek out people with a specific interest, no matter what that interest may be, (BDSM, model train collecting, juggling enthusiasts) it can be a difficult chore indeed. And when you do find them, they may not be as knowledgeable, or experienced, or even as interested as you would expect. When it comes to a group setting, if you don't have great people leading the charge, the group tends to become sub-standard.

When I was living in a smaller city I considered going to the local munch... however the only group in town met at a restaurant where I had a professional relationship with the owners (who were always there). I really didn't feel like mixing business with kink, so I never went. Using a kink-specific dating site was the only thing that made sense at the time. Of course I could get "dates" but I was really tired of dating vanilla men and was tired of wasting time there. It is of no suprise that when I met Master, we were living three hours apart.

Since we have moved we have thought about going to local munches, but there has always seemed to be something else happening that prevented us from getting there. I would love to have a couple of r/l kinky friends, not for play, but just to understand the nature of our relationship and where we are coming from. It might work out eventually, but it hasn't been a huge priority as of late.