Jasper Canada was the furthest north we have come on this trip. We have each observed that this is probably as far north as we will ever get. This may have been our trip to Alaska. It was very nice, if somewhat more warm than expected. Heat waves have a way of happening anywhere.

It was lovely anyway. And spring-like anyway. And we visited as much of it as we could in the time we had.

Paint Brushes have been in season for much of our journey, as we have moved northward. They seem to have become this trip’s official flower. But we don’t remember ever seeing yellow Paint Brushes before Jasper.

And snow capped mountains. One could get tired of snow capped mountains. But there were also plenty of bare stone and tree covered mountains.

And wildlife.

We went to a hot springs to soak and play – No Photos – it was a very gray day and the place was crowded but not near full. It was about a 60 mile side trip and everyone loved the 40 C waters. Then there were cooler pools of 38, 25 and 20 C for a break from the heat.

We went to several water falls. Some were tall and elegant and fragile. Some shook the ground and thundered like Niagara.

We hiked many woods. And found many lakes. And you would not believe the rock formations.

We “flew” to the top of Mount Whistler for a bird’s eye view of the region. It was a cloudy day and clouds were moving all about us.

This is the view Eastward from Mount Whistler. The village in the center is Jasper. The white stripe is the Athabasca River, which is white this time of year from what they call rock flour in the glacier melt water. Every body of water had unique colors from the kind of stone that was being ground up by its parent glacier. In the woods at the lower right, you may see little white spots in the trees. Those are white RVs and tents in our campground.

We are now camping in Lake Louise, which is about 150 miles south, back in Banff National Park and will post another update in a few days.

We are now in Jasper National Park, having driven the length of the Icefields Parkway Sunday. We are here for five nights, but here are some photos from the drive and the first day looking about. 

Canada Rail

Bow Lake

Peyto Lake

Saskatchewan River

Spring Wildflowers along a path

Mount Edith Cavell

Glacier and lake at the foot of Edith Cavell

Us at Mount Edith Cavell

Mike above a mountain stream

Waterfowl Lake

Being a little astonished

In planning our trip, one of the decisions was to stay in Canada for the 4^th of July and avoid all of the dither back home. Unfortunately it turns out that Canada celebrates its liberation on July 1. It’s called Canada Day, and all about were carrying little red and white maple leaf flags for Canada Day. Jasper was shut down for Canada Day. The festivities began with a citywide pancake breakfast for $2.00 each and proceeded through the hours with parties and parades and fireworks at “about” 11:15. It turns out that we are far enough north that the night is sunlit until close to 11 each night.

Mike has not been feeling well since yesterday and so today is a very lazy day for both of us. I slept until after 7. Mike announced he was in no hurry to get up at about 7:45..

It also rained all night, which was actually a welcome relief. We have had some heat in Canada. One day in Banff it was 95, though they called it 33. We looked on the web and found the high in Austin was 93 that day. The graphs of average temperatures indicated we should plan for highs around 72 and lows in the mid 40’s. We hadn’t even seen the 50’s until this morning after the rain.

Fortunately we brought our air conditioner. But we had brought clothing for a cooler climate, so we have almost run out of shorts and short sleeve shirts. Our planning included the notion that we would have enough clothes for the 12 days in Canada without having to do laundry until we were back in the states. They have laundries here. We just figured we would run about saying, “Wow!” all the time and not have to wash clothes. And, as it turns out, doing laundry on Canada Day is not as easy as it might have seemed because of all the other goings ons.

This trip has been a whirlwind and we are already becoming confused about what has happened to us. Fortunately it is raining today and we have stopped to catch up with ourselves. It is also time to catch up with our blog.

We spent three nights in the town of Banff, Canada. It is really a lovely little town, of about 8000 permanent residents, surrounded by mountains in all directions and by Banff National Park for quite some distance. Our campground was just on the fringe of town. Although one might find a vantage point to look down upon the village, we were in deep forest and mountains. We took several day trips, among other things hiking Johnston Canyon and riding the ski lift into the mountains across from Lake Louise (an hour drive north of Banff) for more high altitude hiking.

Dennis in Banff

Banff Street scene

The Bow River in downtown Banff

Our Campground

An Elk who wanted us to know we should not come any closer

Johnston Canyon

Mike at the Johnson Falls

Wild Rose in the woods

The Fairmont Chateau Lodge on Lake Louise – taken from the mountains across the valley

View from our hike on the Ski Trails above Lake Louise

We have spent the last three days at Glacier National Park in Montana. The park is remarkable. Shortly after arriving in the park we saw two bears running across a hillside. We have also seen bighorn sheep, marmots, hawks, coyotes, deer and the furriest squirrels in the lower 48.

 

The scenery is phenomenal: towering mountains with snow-capped peaks, snow melt waterfalls, alpine meadows carpeted with wildflowers, turquoise lakes and temperate rain forests.

 

Tomorrow we leave for Canada. Enjoy the photos!