Canada Having had such a great time in Banff in December 2009, we though it might be nice to revisit the area in 2011. However, for a bit of variety we thought we’d spend a few days in Jasper and Lake Louise too. We spent a couple of nights in Jasper during our first visit to Canada in 2003, but didn’t having enough time in our busy schedule to explore the area. And we’ve visited Lake Louise twice before but never stayed there. So this was an excellent opportunity to tick them both off the list.
Delta Calgary Airport Friday - Our nine hour flight from the fabulous Terminal 5 at Heathrow arrived in Calgary in the early evening, which didn't really leave us much time to pick up a car and drive anywhere. So we decided to spend our first night in Canada in the Delta hotel at the airport. This is a photo of their lobby/atrium. Sadly we didn't have the energy to have a go in their swimming pool.
Room View This was the view from our room and also the first photo I took with the ultra-wide angle Tokina 11-16mm lens I'd received in the post a day earlier.
Brrr Saturday - First job of the day was to pick up our hire car. Just like the last time we were in Calgary, almost exactly two years ago, it was completely brass-monkeys outside. In an effort to ensure that our hire car looked nice and clean when we picked it up, the Hertz people kindly hosed it down before leaving it standing around for a few hours in the -25C air. Consequently, by the time we turned up the doors and boot were thoroughly frozen shut. It took a good amount of time and effort to "break" in. I'm slightly surprised that we didn't actually break anything whilst doing so.
Mountains We eventually prised our way in to the hire car and headed off towards Jasper. Our original plan was to drive to Jasper via Edmonton to the North. However, as it was a lovely sunny day, we decided to head directly West into the mountains via Banff. Just to increase the scenic factor even further, we took a "minor" detour via Kananaskis. I say "minor" because actually it added around 100 miles to our journey to Jasper. But it was worth it for the awesome scenery.This is a photo of our car. As the Jeep Cherokee-or-similar that we'd booked wasn't available (as usual), we had been upgraded to this "full-size" SUV, the Ford Expedition Limited Max. And "full-size" was a very good word for it. A quick Internet search indicated that it had a 310bhp 5.4 litre V8, seven seats and a full compliment of toys, including sat-nav and heated and cooled seats (even the back seats are heated and the rear-most seats will fold away at the touch of a button). All in all, it was really rather nice.
Smith-Dorien Spray Trail From Kananaskis we picked up the amazing Smith-Dorien Spray Trail, a fifty mile long gravel road that runs from Kananaskis Lakes to Canmore. If time and the weather permit, I always try to divert down this road when I'm in the area as it's one of the most stunning roads I have ever have the opportunity to drive on.
Moose About a mile up the road from where I took the previous photo, we came across this moose eating the salt/grit off the road.
Moose As we approached, it moved away slightly.
Moose It definitely didn't seem keen to move too far from the road and immediately returned to eating the salt/grit as soon as we moved away.
Smith-Dorien Spray Trail A photo in the side mirror of the snow trail we were kicking up.
SUV Judith standing next to our SUV, just to give it a bit of scale.
Morant's Curve Looking South from Morant's Curve.
Morant's Curve Looking North from Morant's Curve. Eventually I will get a photo of a train passing this allegedly most scenic of train-spotting spots.
Icefields Parkway Eventually we rejoined Highway 1 before picking up Highway 93, the Icefields Parkway. The Icefields Parkway runs for around 150 miles from Lake Louise to Jasper and is widely considered to be one of the most scenic drives in the world.
Icefields Parkway More scenery on the Icefields Parkway.
Crow While I was taking the previous photo, this crow flew over to see what was going on, presumably in the hope that we might have some food for it (which we didn't because feeding the wildlife is strictly phohibited).
Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge After several hours of driving, we finally made it to the Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge just before sunset. The resort was very much like a posh Center Parks, sitting in 5,000 acres of forests and lakes a few miles outside of Jasper. This was Judith sitting in the lounge of our lake-view suite.
Stars After dinner, I braved the cold to drive a few miles from the resort onto Maligne Lake Road to take this photo of the sky. Having turned off the engine and lights, it was really, really dark and really, really quiet. It was also still really, really cold. So I decided to stay in the car, wind the window down and just balance the camera on the door.For the technically minded, this photo was taken using a 30 second shutter at f/2.8 and ISO-1600. I managed to fire off about half-a-dozen of these long exposure shots before my hands had gone sufficiently numb that I decided to call it a day and head back to the hotel. However, as is often the way, the first photo was the best one.
Maligne Lake Road Sunday - It was still well below -20C and we had decided to drive the 25 miles-or-so to Maligne Lake. This was a miscellaneous view on Maligne Lake Road. You could stop the car at almost any point and point the camera in almost any direction and see a view like this.
Medicine Lake On the way to Maligne Lake we passed Medicine Lake. It's famous (in these parts at least) for disappearing into a series of underground channels when the water flow reduces during the summer, becoming Medicine Field-of-Rocks-and-Dry-Mud.
Fox While I was taking a photo of the lake with my new ultra-wide lens, a fox walked almost right past the car. This is a photo of its tracks that I took once I'd got my zoom lens back on. Doh!
Fox Judith managed to get this photo of the fox walking off into the distance while I was reconfiguring my camera. I knew this sort of thing would happen once I had two lenses.
Caribou Crossing? This was not true. We saw no caribou.
Car Park A picture of Judith next to our monster truck in the car park at Maligne Lake.
Maligne Lake A view of Maligne Lake. Or at least a view of the snow covering the ice that's covering Maligne Lake.
Fox On the way back to the hotel we got a brief view of another fox. Or maybe the same fox, as it was in the vicinity of the earlier sighting.
Maligne Canyon On the way back to the hotel, we stopped off in Maligne Canyon. You can just make out Judith on the bridge.
Maligne Canyon Unfortunately there's nothing in this photo to provide scale to the icicles, which were probably in excess of 15 feet long.
Valley View A view looking towards Jasper from near Maligne Canyon.
Lake Beauver This was a view across Lake Beauver, taken from near our room/cabin, with the sun setting behind the mountains in the distance.
Lake Beauver Almost exactly the same view as in the previous photo, but I couldn't decide which I preferred, so I've included them both.
Athabasca River Monday - It had warmed up a bit (to about -10C), so we decided to walk the four miles-or-so from the resort, along the Athabasca River and into Jasper for some lunch. This bit of the river was a combination of dried up and frozen. However, it was still flowing freely a couple of hundred yards away, so the bridge you can see in the distance was still a functional necessity.
Squirrel A squirrel. In a tree.
Pyramid Mountain This was the view of Pyramid Mountain from the trail. I've converted it to black and white because there was virtually no colour in the photo anyway and this (I think) makes it more dramatic.
Pyramid Lake Having returned to the hotel, we went for a drive up to Pyramid Lake, just for a look around. There wasn't much going on around there at this time of the year as the hotels were all closed for the season.
Rockie Mountaineer Back in Jasper, the Rockie Mountaineer was just arriving in town.
Monster Truck For scale, here's a photo of our Ford Expedition Limited Max parked next to a Jag.
Fuel Tuesday - Today we were relocating from Jasper to Lake Louise. However, first we needed to top up the fuel tank of our Ford Expedition. Despite the trip computer saying there was still enough fuel left to drive another 120 miles or so, it takes 100.004 liters of fuel to fill the tank. Apparently the tank had a capacity of 127 litres, which would go some way to explaining how a vehicle that does less than 20mpg (even with my feather-foot at the helm) still has a potential range of around 500 miles. Imagine how far it would be able to go if it was powered by a super-frugal European-style diesel motor!
Icefields Parkway As we drove onto the Icefields Parkway to start our 150 mile drive to Lake Louise, the status board was showing double yellow, i.e. poor conditions, travel not recommended. Unfortunately we'd pre-payed for our room at the enormously expensive Fairmont Chateaux Lake Louise, so we were not inclined to not turn up.
Icefields Parkway This was the state of the Icefields Parkway as we left Jasper with about 150 miles to drive to Lake Louise. Somewhere under all that snow was a road. The only thing to do was to drive up the sort of "middle", i.e. about half way between the trees. There are no towns on this road and only a couple of hotels (which were closed for the winter anyway), so once we'd set out we wouldn't have much option but to keep going.
Bighorn Sheep This Bighorn sheep didn't look too worried about the conditions.
Icefields Parkway The driving conditions varied from poor to downright terrifying. The road goes over a couple of passes where we were driving through around a foot of fresh snow in an almost complete white-out, which was not an enjoyable experience at all.
Icefields Parkway And so it continued, all the way to Lake Louise. Along the way we had seen a snow plough on its side by the road and a 4x4 on its roof in one of the passes. Rarely have I been so relieved to complete a journey. It was amazing to think that this was the same spectacular road that we had driven down in the opposite direction under a clear, blue sky only three days eariler.
Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise This was the sitting room bit of our mini-suite on the sixth floor of the Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise. Nice.
Victoria Room Having settled in and unpacked, we went for a wander round the hotel. This was the third time we'd been to Lake Louise, but the first time we had stayed at the hotel. Usually most of the hotel is inaccessible to non-residents, so it was nice to finally be able to take a good look around. This was the Victoria Room.
Lake Louise Out front of the hotel, the view of the mountains and glaciers around Lake Louise was somewhat obscured. It was still fairly early though, so we decided to go for a walk down the relatively short trail to the far end of the lake. It was a round trip of 4km (about 2.5 miles), but it was flat (because it's by the lake shore) and the snow had been well trodden by many people today already, so the going was pretty easy.
Lake Louise By the time we reached the other end of the lake the view was starting to improve somewhat.I went a bit bonkers with photos of the mountains around the lake, so if you're not interested in that sort of thing, you might want to skip on a few photos now.
Lake Louise
Hotel View A while later, we made it back to the hotel for dinner. This was the view from our room.
Hotel View Wednesday - Despite the fact that it was pretty clear when we went to bed, there had been almost a foot of snow overnight and it was still snowing quite heavily, which had somewhat obscured the view again. Still, that was no reason not to head outside.
Outside Me sitting on a bench, wondering what to do in all this snow.
Snowshoes Having waded around for a while in the knee-deep snow, we decided that it might be a good idea to rent some snowshoes for the day. After getting kitted out with snowshoes and sticks (poles?), we decided to head up to The Lookout. The Lookout is a view point a couple of miles from the hotel, about 500 feet up the side of the mountain on the South side of the lake. As we set out on the trail, it was immediately apparent from the deep, unbroken snow that we were the first people to try to tackle the trail for a while, which was kind of exciting. Ray Meares would be impressed (probably).
The Lookout The hotel was just visible through the trees. I know these areas are in National Parks and everything, so they're supposed to be looking after the trees. But it seems to me that they could at least chop a few down in front of some of the view points. I've lost count of the number of view points I've visited over the years that presumably had a magnificent outlook when they were built, but where the view has gradually become completely obscured by growing trees over the years. Surely it wouldn't be an environmental disaster just to chop down, say, half-a-dozen in front of each view point to allow people to actually see the view they've made such an effort to visit?
Resting Judith resting on a bench at The Lookout.
Train Having returned to the hotel, we picked up the car and drove into town with a view to completing some of the Bow River Loop Trail. On the way we passed this train, which was being propelled by FIVE locomotives. Unfortunately it had stopped, presumably for a bit of a rest, so we were unable to see just how massively long it was. However, I have video from a previous visit to Canada where one of these trains, travelling at 50kph (I know that because I had to overtake it in my car to get in front of it to video it when it caught me up), took a full five minutes to pass by. That would make the train some 4km (2.5 miles) long.Unfortunately we didn't get to complete any of the Bow River Loop Trail as the trail's car park is covered in very deep snow. I drove a few feet in, but even with four-wheel-drive we were struggling to make progress. Rather than risk getting stuck, we decided to play safe and head back to the hotel.
Lakeside Trail There was still an hour-or-so before dark, so we decided to walk the lakeside trail again. At this point, visibility wasn't much improved from yesterday.
Stars Thursday - I woke up about an hour before sunrise and looked out of the window to see that the sky is almost completely clear. As it was only the second time this week that had happened, I headed outside to take a few photos before the sun cames up. This was the view from the front of the hotel, again using a 30-second exposure.
Hotel And this was the view looking back towards the hotel.
Lake View We were scheduled to relocate to Banff, but as the weather was the best we'd seen since we arrived in Lake Louise, we decided to hang around for a while.
Trees The hotel's staff had already been out in their diggers, ploughing the paths around the hotel, which was just as well as there had been several inches more snow overnight.
More Trees
Bench This was the view from the lakeside trail, looking back towards the hotel. There's a bench somewhere under that mound of snow in the foreground.
Hotel We walked a couple of hundred meters further down the lakeside trail to get a better view of the hotel. If you go far enough, there's a great view of the hotel set against the mountains in the distance. Unfortunately we couldn't be bothered to walk that far morning, so we could just see the mountains peeking over the top of the hotel.Eventually it was time to head off to Banff.
Johnson Canyon On the way to Banff, we took a minor detour to Johnson Canyon. Apart from the canyon itself, there were a couple of waterfalls to see. The first was only around an hours walk from the car park, whilst the second was two hours walk. Here's Judith on the bridge at the foot of the first waterfall. I did take a few photos of the waterfall itself, but it was pretty much completely frozen and there was nothing to give it any scale, so I've not bothered to include any of them.As it was already the middle of the afternoon, we didn't feel there was time to press on to the second waterfall (plus it's nice to leave something for next time), so we headed back to the car.
Johnson Canyon Judith on the walkway through Johnson Canyon.
Bighorn Sheep Back on Highway 1a to Banff we came across several Bighorn sheep eating the salt/grit from the road. As I stopped to take a photo, this sheep walked over to the car and started to lick the salt off the side.
Banff An hour or so later and we were once again on Banff high street, with the famous down-the-high-street view of Cascade Mountain.
Car Park Our hotel had an underground car park. There was a height restrictor bar at the entrance set at 6'3", which the roof of our car connected with quite firmly on the way in. So we proceed very slowly and carefully, stopping every few feet to check the clearance between the roof of the car and the pipes on the ceiling. It turned out that the height restrictor bar was unduly pessimistic and there were easily four or five inches of clearance left, as you can see from the photo.
Fox Suites The hotel at which we were staying was the Fox Suites, which was essentially a load of small appartments, rather than conventional hotel rooms. No issue with that. However, everyone's "room" was effectively outdoors. So you had to go outside in the freezing cold to get to anywhere from your room, e.g. breakfast, the pool, etc. This was a bit of a bind. It also couldn't be that nice for the housekeeping staff who needed to spend half of their working life outside, freezing to death as they move between rooms. Still, Trip Advisor show this as the number 1 rated hotel in Banff when we were there, so they must be doing something right.
Deer Friday - We were out for a walk around town. There were quite a few deer in the town, just walking about in the streets and in people's gardens.
Vermilion Lakes On the edge of town are the Vermilion Lakes, which offered some lovely views.
Vermilion Lakes Again, I've been unable to choose between the black and white and colour versions of this photo, so I've included both.
Lake Minnewanka No trip to Banff would be complete without a drive out to Lake Minnewanka. Interestingly, despite the fact that every lake we'd seen so far on our trip had been completely frozen over and covered with snow, Lake Minnewanka was completely free of ice.
Two Jack Lake A couple of miles away, Two Jack Lake was conforming to the standard of being frozen over, making the unfrozen Minnewanka seem even more unusual.
Car/Mountain View Here's a nice view of our car and the mountains around Two Jack Lake.
Stars This was taken in the garden in front of the town hall in the middle of Banff using a 30 second shutter, which is why the trees in the foreground are so very illuminated. It is presumably testimony to the clarity of their air that there's no orange glow washing out the sky and hiding the stars.
Smith-Dorien Spray Trail - Again Saturday - Going home day, but our flight isn't until the evening, so we had plenty of time to make our way back to Calgary. Which provided an excellent opportunity for another drive down the Smith-Dorien Spray Trail to Kananaskis. Given the amount of snow there had been at Lake Louise, we were initially a bit concerned that the going might be somewhat tricky. But it appeared that there hadn't been much snow at all.
Ford A final look at our brilliant Ford Expedition Limited Max.
Moose Coincidentally we saw another moose about a mile from where we saw the first one. And we're fairly confident that it' wasn't the same one as this one was sporting a set of antlers (although I can't say that I definitely know how fast moose antlers grow, so maybe it is the same one after all?).
Bye Bye Beer We arrived at the airport with enough time to spare to squeeze in a couple of pints of Rickard's Red before boarding the plane.And so ended another fabulous holiday in Canada.