Day 5

Day 5, Thursday, September 27, 2012

Stayed at the Deer Lodge in Lake Louise. It's outrageously expensive—location, location, location. It's next door to the Fairmont which is next door to Lake Louise. Room was OK, nothing to write home about. Breakfast not included. In the morning, we discovered we had a nice patio with a table and two chairs. Oh well. Had breakfast in the restaurant and then walked up to Lake Louise. It's that incredible turquoise that you've seen in the pictures.

Next up was the drive up to Moraine Lake. Also incredible turquoise. All the lakes up here are like that—they are glacier melt lakes and the color comes from sediments suspended in the water. The color doesn't seem to show up too good in photographs.

We then started up the Icefields Parkway heading for Jasper. We knew we weren't going to be able to do all the stops along the way because we didn't want to arriving after dark again. We will be driving back down the parkway on our way to Banff. We viewed Hector Lake, the Crowfoot Glacier, Bow Lake & Summit, and did another of those “short” hikes up to Peyto Lake. It's a long way uphill, over rocks and roots, and begins to feel like the Bataan Death March after a while. But it was worth it. The lakes REALLY look turquoise when you're looking down on them from on high.

Then we strolled in to see Mistaya Canyon—not exactly a stroll, but it sure felt like it after Peyto Lake! This is a canyon carved out by the Mistaya River. It's pretty amazing to see what those seemingly innocent rivers can do to rock!

After that, we decided we had better put the pedal to the metal and head for Jasper. Arrived at the Patricia Lake Bungalows around 6:30. We have a little cottage with a fireplace. Very close to the lake. Went into Jasper for a quick dinner at Jasper Pizza.

Have given up on uploading pictures out in the wilderness. The wi-fi is dialup speed. If we get back to someplace with speedier wi-fi, I'll add them later or wait until I get home.