Wednesday, August 5, 2015
We are in Banff National Park, Alberta, Canada, and we
have finally found the tourists we’ve been missing all summer. They are all here.
We left Hinton, where we were parked, yesterday morning
and headed for Banff. To get there, we
drove through Jasper National Park and got on the Icefields Parkway, which
joins the two. That gave us the chance
to get one last look at Jasper.
The animals didn’t disappoint, as both the Big Horn sheep
and the elk were out. 15 or 20 sheep
covered a hillside beside the road.
No males with big horns this morning.
Shortly after we spotted 3 elk waking up beside the
road. Here’s one of them.
We’ve enjoyed seeing these animals most days and don’t
know what Banff will bring.
Here are a couple of last pictures of Jasper National
Park.
When we stopped to take the next picture, we encountered
the first crowd of tourists. There was a
bus, several RVs and numerous cars parked at the overlook, but Steve managed to
get a good shot of the glaciers.
Our next stop was at the Icefield Center, which promised
displays, information and a restaurant.
We had packed our lunch, as we weren’t sure what time we might reach the
Center, which was a good thing, as it was packed. It was easily as packed as Disneyland has
been. And the exhibit area was closed.
Steve fought his way up to the observation floor and took
a picture of the Athabasca glacier.
It’s one of several glaciers that meet in the Columbia
Ice Field above it. In the photo, there
are actually two buses on the glacier.
You could also drive to a parking lot below the glacier
and walk up to it. We didn’t do either,
as the weather wasn’t looking too good and we still had quite a way to go.
I took a picture on our way back to the parking lot of the
glacier and the fireweed we’ve grown to love.
Shortly after, it began to rain. It rained all the way to the town of Banff
and our campground just beyond. The
phone routed us through Banff and it was like trying to drive around campus at
class change time. I think we may be
experiencing some culture shock, as we haven’t seen this much traffic, both
vehicular and pedestrian since we left Bellingham, Washington.
But we made it to our campground and Steve got us set up
in the rain. The view out our back
window is another camper, but when the rain stopped, Steve took this shot from
our doorway.
Steve did his homework and everything said to get started
early to avoid crowds. The number one
item to see in Banff according to TripAdvisor is Moraine Lake, so that’s where
we headed. I took this shot of the
clouds nestled in among the mountain tops and hoped we would have a view to see
when we got to the lake.
We identified two short trails and headed for the one
with the best views.
So up Rock Pile trail we went. It’s not long (300 meters), but mostly
uphill. And the lake is at 6,000 feet,
but I made it. My lungs and thighs felt
it, though.
But the view made it worth it. Here’s one mountain on the way up.
And here’s Moraine Lake.
The picture doesn’t do it justice.
It’s just gorgeous.
And, our wildlife picture of the day.
When we finished the rest of the crowds had arrived. The parking lot was filled. I think there was almost a mile of cars
parked on the side of the road leading up to the parking lot. I’m thankful that Steve got us going early!
Lake Louise, which is often the picture you see of Banff,
was next on our list, but the traffic was so bad, we decided it wasn’t worth
the fight and headed back towards our campground near the town of Banff. There was a scenic route back, the Bow Valley
Parkway, which promised more likelihood of seeing wildlife than the 4 lane
divided highway, so we took that.
It had started clouding up again, so we didn’t have good
luck with scenery shots. But we stopped
so Steve could hike part of Johnston Canyon and see the falls.
We then headed for home before the rain came.
Deb
