Canadian Rockies – August 28th to September 1st

From Vancouver we had a rather large drive ahead of us to the Canadian Rocky Mountains, so we headed off later than planned as usual, and drove pretty much all day to the town of Golden at the edge of the Rockies. Saw some pretty nice scenery on the way, but also a lot of highway….

Rediscovering roll-ups :)

Views of the Rocky Mountains

We spent the night at a campground in Golden, and headed to the touristy town of Lake Louise the next day. The actual Lake Louise and Lake Moraine are incredibly beautiful, and it was very easy to see why there are so many people there! Although we didn’t spend a whole lot of time there, it’s definitely a place we’d like to spend more time at, hopefully within the next few months before winter hits and when there are many less tourists (then more in winter when everything is frozen and/or snow covered!).

Lake Louise is a gorgeous milky green colour, or was the day we were there at least – the colour changes slightly all the time apparently. The lake is glacier fed, has views up to a massive glacier/glaciers behind it, and is freezing, but oh so beautiful! There are lots of hikes around there, but after deciding we’d definitely be coming back, we ended up just going on a pretty short one up to a lookout over the lake, which was awesome – we also managed to see the not so common sight of a porcupine asleep in a tree!

Lake Louise

Lawrie at Lake Louise - glaciers behind

Porcupine sleeping in a tree!

Lake Louise and the Fairmont Chateau

Then we headed to Moraine Lake, also in the Lake Louise area, which was somehow even more spectacular! This lake also changes colour, but was an amazing bright blue colour from above, and less blue but very reflective from the lake shore. There are heaps of hiking trails around Moraine Lake, but again as we’d decided to come back (and maybe get a little more sleep beforehand…), as well as the fact that it’s illegal to do most of the trails with less than 4 people, staying less than 3m apart at all times, with at least one person armed with bear spray, we bypassed most of the hikes! Next time though…

So it seems that grizzly bears are pretty common around the area! Needless to say we didn’t’ see any, but there is apparently one around the area that is attacking the slightly smaller black bears! Which I imagine would still fare much better than a pretty much defenceless human! And around the lake shore of Lake Louise there has been a cougar (mountain lion) stalking people on the very crowded trail around the lake, which is kind of… interesting!

Moraine Lake at water level

Stunningly blue Moraine Lake from the nearby 'Rockpile'

Fat little chipmunk in front of the lake

Bear warnings/restrictions sign...

Cute little pika

From Lake Louise we headed past the more touristy town of Banff to the little town of Canmore, where people actually live and work and the sole purpose of the town isn’t just for tourists… We had an awesome and massive dinner at Boston Pizza, as well as a thoroughly unnecessary but delicious smores pizza for dessert… Then retired to a quiet local street to spend the night, as the Safeway car park was a little small and crowded.

We checked out a few of the many little shops in Canmore, then went to check out some bike trails. After we made our way to the Canmore Nordic Centre (many cross country biking and skiing trails, built for the 1988 Olympics) it was early afternoon, so although the trails sounded fantastic for us both, it would be more worth coming back another time to make the most of a whole day there!

So we headed to Banff for the rest of the afternoon, where we, together with many many other tourists, wandered through heaps of little shops, including shops of tourist goods that all looked the same after about 2 shops, and managed to purchase a half price snow jacket each… We discovered Squish’s Sandwich Cellar (or a similar sort of name), which made for an awesome lunch, and then retired to the hot springs for the evening – fantastic way to spend the day, plus it meant we got a shower… J

We found a campground on the way back to Lake Louise, and headed to the Lake in the morning, discovering that the end of summer there can be colder than our winter! It was -1ºC at about 8am, and there was ice on the wooden deck around the lake… So we gathered that summer was probably coming to a thorough end…

View from part of the Icefields Parkway

Different looking Lake Louise in the morning

Freezing!

From Lake Louise we headed up the beautiful Icefields Parkway to Jasper, in the Banff and Jasper National Parks. We didn’t see any of the wildlife that they say to watch out for along the way, but we saw some more incredibly blue and reflective glacial lakes, and some massive glaciers and mountains! This road is advertised as the most beautiful drive in the world (as I’m sure are a few others…), not entirely sure if that’s the case, but it sure was beautiful!

Reflections on Bow Lake

Peyto Lake, with its wolf head shape

One of the many awesome glaciers along the Icefields Parkway

Part of the Icefields Parkway, between the mountains

The Athabasca Glacier, part of the massive Columbia Icefield

The next glacier, looking slightly more beautiful

Crowds at the Columbia Icefield

Although we planned on spending more time in the town of Jasper at the northern end of the Icefields Parkway, and visiting the nearby Maligne Lake, it was Saturday night and it turns out there are no meetings in Jasper, so we headed to the nearby town of Hinton…