Day 8

Day 8, Sunday, September 30, 2012

Great day! Had breakfast at the hotel and then headed back to Johnston Canyon. You actually hike into the canyon here—the path is sometimes cantilevered from the canyon wall. Here's what the path looks like:

It's about a mile round trip. Great views along the way. When you get to the canyon, you can crawl through a small cave and get up close and personal with the waterfall. It was great. Here's the waterfall and the cave:

We then headed back to Banff to drive the road up Mt. Norquay. Views up there probably as good as those from the Banff Gondola and a lot cheaper! Saw the first of the iridescent birds up there. Don't know what kind of bird it is, but it has the most amazing blue and green plumage.

Then headed back down to Banff to find a picnic spot to eat our lunch. Right by the side of the road was a flock of mountain goats. They were intent on licking something in the gravel (salt?) and let everyone get quite close for pictures.

OK, doesn't it look like this guy is saying, "Move over!"

Found a great picnic table beside the Bow River and had lunch with another of those friendly iridescent birds. This guy was a riot—kept hopping around and chirping away at us.

Went up to check out the famous Fairmont—quite a place. Then went to the Bow Falls and then back to the room. Our legs were ready for a rest!

Day 7

Day 7, Saturday, September 29, 2012

Went back to Papa George's for breakfast. Did not get the same wonderful waitress we had yesterday, so it took seemingly forever.

Then we headed back down the Icefields Parkway to catch what we missed on the way up. First stop was Athabasca Falls. Really awesome. Also quite accessible, no hiking up hill, down dale, through mud, etc. Probably one of the most impressive sights we've seen.

We are having intermittent rain showers today, first time we haven't had cloudless blue skies. Fortunately, it seems to rain when we're inside. Got a few drops at the falls, but nothing serious.

Then on to Sunwapta Falls. Good falls, but not quite as dramatic as the Athabasca Falls.

Next up was the Columbia Icefield Centre and the Athabasca Glacier. The glacier used to come down over the highway and the parking lot of the Centre. It has retreated quite a bit over the last 100 years. We elected not to walk up to the toe or to ride the snow coaches on the glacier. They have excellent exhibits on glaciers in the Centre.

That covered the items we had missed on our trip up the Parkway. When we got to Lake Louise, we took the Bow Valley Parkway instead of the main highway. Good decision! Much more scenic. Spotted a bull elk in a meadow and pulled over with several cars to photograph him. Then about ten miles up the road were four bull elks grazing up on the hillside! It's supposed to be rutting season, but we didn't see any female elks—we decided they were hiding from the testosterone-crazed males.

By this time it was getting late, so we decided to save Johnston Canyon for tomorrow. Wanted to arrive in Banff in daylight with some time to stroll the town.

Had dinner at Giorgio's Trattoria. Food was pretty pedestrian, but the joint was jumping! Every table full. Strolled the shops on the way down Banff Avenue to the restaurant and continued strolling down that side after dinner. Then crossed over to the other side to head back to the hotel. Found a great gelato shop, so had to have gelato for dessert.

Forgot to mention the porcupine we saw.  Here he is:

Here's the first elk:

Here are some of those up on the hillside.  We discovered there were 5 when reviewing the pictures tonight.

And, last but not least, Athabasca Falls:

Day 6

Friday, September 28, 2012

We got up and headed downtown for breakfast at a restaurant we had spotted last night while looking for a place to have dinner. Papa George's. Good breakfast special for a reasonable price—reasonable for Jasper, that is.

Then off to the drive to Maligne Lake. So named because some foolish Dutch priest decided to try to ford the Maligne River against advice from the Indians and was almost swept downstream. Of course this was the river's fault. So he cursed the river and called it maligne, which is French for evil. When Mary Schaffer came along later to explore and name all the mountains and the lake, she decided to keep the name.

Anyway, this is the lake that has the famous Spirit Island which can only be reached by boat. It's the second-most photographed sight in the Canadian Rockies. The lake is beautiful and when the boat reaches Spirit Island, it docks on the mainland and you get to get out and walk around and photograph things. We had a very interesting guide, learned all sorts of stuff about avalanches and rock slides.

Then we headed back along Maligne Lake Road to Maligne Canyon. A reasonable trail led to two different bridges across the canyon which provided interesting viewpoints. It's always awesome to see these rivers pouring through these canyons. This one had a pretty spectacular waterfall. I wish my old brain could remember to take a video so as to record the sound, but I never seem to think of it at the time.

Then we cruised through the Fairmont grounds, but decided their lake wasn't too exciting. Back to Jasper for a very late lunch. Stopped at the grocery store to get some bread & cheese for a late dinner out at Patricia Lake so we wouldn't have to go back into town for dinner. Ate at Earl's on the patio overlooking Jasper. Great food at great Jasper prices.

Then back to Patricia Lake. We checked out all the facilities we didn't have time to check out last night. Nice dock and sitting area on the lake and boats, canoes, etc. for rent. Seems to be a popular resort—it's full.

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.

Day 4

Day 4, Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Got up and had a good breakfast at the hotel. Packed up the car and decided to check the bench where we sat by the river to watch the sunset. Lo and behold, there sat my missing notebook. Guess it wanted a sleepover by the river. It was a tad damp, but we dried it out.

So, off to downtown Revelstoke to find Parks Canada and get a pass for both us good for all the parks we will be visiting. Canada doesn't offer that great $10 good for a lifetime senior pass. Then we filled up with gas and headed for Revelstoke National Park. Somehow, we missed the turn off to the Meadows in the Sky Parkway which seems to have been before the actual park begins. We decided not to go back because there is a lot of road construction on the Trans-Canada Highway. As it turned out, this was a good decision, because we just plain ran out of time.

Next up was a short walk through an old growth cedar & hemlock forest. Smelled great in there.

Now on to Glacier National Park. Stopped at the Rogers Pass Discovery Center to look around and take pictures of the great scenery. Also have fun pictures of Heidi and me, but there aren't going to be any pictures tonight because the wi-fi here at the pricy Deer Lodge at Lake Louise is painfully slow.

Next was Yoho National Park. This is where the scenery starts to get really spectacular. We took the hike to Wapta Falls which said it was only 2.4 kilometers. That turned out to be one way. The entire Kicking Horse River plunges over the falls—it's been called the Niagra Falls of the west. Maybe in the spring. I mean the water was thundering over the falls, but it's not anywhere near as big as Niagara. Anyway, that took quite a while as it is up hill and down dale, through mud puddles, and over lots of tree roots.

Now it's getting seriously late in the day since we've lost an hour. So we made a quick stop at the Spiral Tunnels viewpoint (waste of time, you can see them better from the highway) and then headed up the hairpin curve road to Takakkaw Falls. Now that was worth the drive. The water is plunging down the mountain about 200 feet. Sounds like a freight train. I can't imagine what it is like in the spring—it was impressive enough in late fall.

Then we backtracked a few klicks to Field to have dinner at the Truffled Pig Café. Of course, a train was parked on the tracks blocking the only way into town. Longest train I've ever seen—had one locomotive in the lead, two in the middle, and one at the end. They finally got moving and the backed-up line of cars could get to Field. If you are in the area, do not miss this place. Food was wonderful. We had the special, wild mushroom ravioli with scallops & pancetta & various root vegetables. Yummy. We “licked” our plates clean with the good bread. By this time, there was not one but two trains blocking the crossing, so of course we had to stay for dessert. Okanagan peach pie with homemade vanilla ice cream & caramel. More yummy!

Our waiter explained that the trains come east from Revelstoke and switch crews here. They grab some sleep in the bunk house and they take a westbound train back to Revelstoke. The other trains are coming west from Calgary—same deal, they switch out crews and end up taking another train back to Calgary. So that's why they park there for about 10-15 minutes. He says they get about 24 trains through there a day. Yikes!

So, finally got out of Field and headed for Lake Louise. Major, major construction on this portion of the highway, so it took a while. Totally dark when we got here, so can't report yet on Lake Louise. Stay tuned. No pics today, it would take years to upload them. I'll be lucky if I can get the blog up.

Day 3

Day 3, Tuesday, September 25, 2014

We slept until around 8 this morning, I think we were both tired. Great full breakfast at the hotel. Cooked to order and served to us at a table.

After breakfast, we headed back to Baker Street. Heidi did her deal with the woman at the gift shop for American dollars to Canadian dollars. We then wandered the street since most of the shops had been closed when we were there last night. Found a few things that had to come home with me, a gift for my grand daughter and another magnet that I liked better than the one I bought yesterday.

We then headed out for our scenic drive up the shore of Kootenay Lake and then Arrow Lake. There's still a lot of haze in the air from the Washington wildfires, so the definition of mountain pictures is not all that could be desired. The disappointing thing about this drive is that there are not a lot of places to pull over and enjoy the views of the lake. But we kept trying.

Wildlife spotting: we saw a lynx and her baby! The mother was running across the highway to her baby—we were just pulling out from an overlook, so were not going fast.

We weren't in any particular hurry, I had forgotten about the ferry schedule. When we thought to check it, we discovered that it would be tight to make the next ferry and we would have an hour's wait if we missed. But we made it! Just. Here's a picture of the traffic on the ferry. Ordinary passenger cars. Motorcycles. HUGE logging trucks. Another huge double bottom truck—no idea what his cargo was.

Once across Upper Arrow Lake, it was on to Revelstoke, our destination for tonight. We're staying at the Best Western Plus, a brand new and very nice hotel. Dumped our stuff off and went down to walk by the Columbia River. Found a bench to sit on and noticed this big bend in the river. We later discovered while downtown that this was the famous Big Eddy and that's what Revelstoke used to be called.

We had asked at the desk for recommendations as to where to have dinner. She recommended a couple of places, one of which sounded quite interesting and had an outdoor patio. The Village Idiot Bar & Grill—now how can you resist a place with a name like that? You should have seen the names of the menu items—they were a riot. I had “We found Nemo and he's delicious!” Very good fish tacos and a delicious salad.

We have been writing down all the interesting names and things we've been seeing. Unfortunately, that notebook has gone missing. Maybe it's hiding with Nemo. All I can remember at the moment was a stop sign that said
“Whoa!”, Whole School (as opposed to Half School?) Canadians seem to have a great sense of humor when naming things.

Time to rest up for our big adventure tomorrow.

Day 2

Day 2, Monday, September 24, 2012

This morning we had to go back to the airport to get Heidi added on as a driver of our rental car. You both have to show up simultaneously in person, who knows why???

Then we headed for Coeur d'Alene, Idaho where we turned north toward Canada. Had lunch at The Badger's Den in Bonner's Ferry, just prior to crossing the border. Nothing special except there were funny license plates in there. Those photos are on my iPhone and no easy way to get them to the blog (that I know of anyway).

Once across the border, we had a bit of trouble finding 3A in Creston which was to take us around the right side of Kootenay Lake so we could take the ferry to the other side. This is part of the Sellkirk Loop drive. Anyway, we finally got ourselves sorted out. This morning we hadn't been able to enter Nelson, B. C. as a destination for our drive, but we discovered later that once in Canada, Mr. Garmin seemed to recognize things and could give us directions to our hotel in Nelson. Who knows with these electronic gizmos???

By the way, the road all the way to the border is under construction and there is very heavy traffic.

Scenery has been good, but it is very hazy. We're not sure if that is from all the forest fires in Washington or is due to a temperature inversion (it's been very hot here), or what the deal is, but it doesn't make for very good photo ops. Tomorrow is supposed to be the big scenery day on the way to Revelstoke, so we're hoping things will be clearer.

Anyway, we made it to Kootenay Bay in time to catch the 3:30 ferry. Here's a picture of the ferry coming to get us.

It's about 35 minutes on the ferry to the other side of the lake. From there, it's a short drive to Nelson. We're staying at the Hume Hotel, right downtown. It's an old hotel with a very creaky elevator. We have sort of a suite—we each have a separate bedroom with a queen bed and we share a bath. We brought out luggage up and then headed out to explore Nelson. Unfortunately, everything seems to close at 5:00 p.m., and I was really kind of disappointed. I had been led to believe from what I'd read that there were lots of artists' galleries and such on Baker Street. We did a little window shopping and discovered a nice cafe called the Main Street Diner which we decided to return to.

We then attempted to reach the river, but access is cut off by the railroad and all sorts of industrial stuff, too bad. We probably could have driven somewhere to access the trail that allegedly runs along the river, but we were not about to give up our parking space in the hotel's very small lot.

So we proceded back to our diner and ate a delicious dinner on their outdoor patio. I had a wonderful crab pita with loads of delicious crab and Heidi had an excellent Greek salad. On closer examination, we discovered the planters fencing in their dining area were their herb garden. A very pleasant spot.

Back to the hotel for desert. On our stroll on Baker Street, we found a bakery which had sinful-looking pastries in the window, so of course we just had to go in. Once in, we discovered they had Nanaimo bars. I've heard a lot about these, so we just had to get one to try. It was good, but pretty rich. We weren't able to finish the whole thing.

Another interesting thing we've discovered is that everyone takes US dollars at par. I paid my bank $1.07 for each of my Canadian dollars. Heidi was offered an exchange rate of 80 cents on the dollar in the Denver airport (which she declined). A shopkeeper told her she will buy her dollars at par if she wants to exchange some tomorrow. They seem to throw it all in the register and treat it all the same—I got change in mixed Canadian and American quarters. Maybe as we get farther into Canada, that won't be the case, but I'm kind of wondering why I paid a premium for my Canadian money.

Sunday, September 23, 2012

Day 1

The trip began well. I was relaxed and ready when Dominique came to pick me up and she was on time, so no worrying like I do with Super Shuttle. We traded information on our new iPhones on the way to the airport. I like her comment on her Facebook page today: how is it a smart phone can make you feel so stupid?  More on that later.

Stopped to get a sandwich as Surdyk's and there was Alia working at the counter. She used to do our hair at Horst long ago. Second time we've seen her at the airport.

Plane was late taking off because they held it for a connecting passenger in a wheelchair who would have otherwise had to wait until 9:00 p.m. for the next flight to Spokane. Uneventful flight and we still arrived on time. We had an empty middle seat which makes things SO much more pleasant. I passed the time reading my old Smithsonians on my iPad (reading puts me to sleep on planes). Switched to playing solitare—that really seems to make the time fly. It's only a 2 1/2 hour flight to Spokane.

Speedy luggage delivery in Spokane—love those smaller airports! Sometimes it seems to take as long as the flight to get your luggage in Minneapolis. Proceeded to Hertz where they offered me some sort of Chevrolet. We had reserved a Corolla. Decided to upgrade to a Camry. Went out to get the car and found it needed to be washed, so they ran it through the car wash and I was off.

First stop was the Visitor Information place downtown. What a pleasant and helpful bunch of women there! Said I was looking for a place to buy a styrofoam cooler as I had flown in and we were going on a road trip. The woman actually looked up potential places and called them to see if they had them! In the meantime, I was chatting with the other woman and discovered that part of our trip will be on the “famous” Selkirk Loop. She gave me a map. They were both interested to hear about our trip and it was so wonderful to have an actual address of a place which would have what I needed so I could plug it into the GPS and head right there.

Arrived at Fred Meyer's shortly and was greeted by a pleasant woman at the door who pointed me in the direction of coolers because this is a HUGE store. Got the cooler and headed back to the car. Tried to call Heidi because I couldn't remember exactly what she had specified about the wine she wanted me to get. Technology snafu! Somehow my new iPhone5 erased her cell number while I was trying to call her. Called her home phone and left a message.

Decided to head on to Costco to pick up a case of water and the wine and called Dominique to ask her what I had done to cause the phone to erase Heidi. She didn't know either, but asked if I had my iPad with me—she would be in my contacts on that. Never would have thought of that. Worked great, I got her cell number again (turns out they were on their way to the airport, so she would never have got the message at home). So we consulted through the wine aisles at Costco and I got her wine and headed for the hotel.

Staying at the Oxford Suites which is right on the river. You walk out the door and hit the Riverfront Trail.

The whole Riverfront Park is fabulous—lots of bridges from one side to the other, great places for viewing the river rushing down, lots of historical information. You could leave the hotel and walk across the river to downtown Spokane to shop or dine of whatever. I just looked and went back to the park. Love this picture of the river—the color is caused by the sun setting on the rocks.

The hotel has a happy hour with free drinks and appetizers, so I had some and then came back to the room as I had only eaten half my sandwich on the plane.

So far so good with hotels, all picked off the internet. Heidi doesn't get in until very late tonight. Tomorrow we head for Nelson, B. C., Canada on part of the famous Selkirk Loop.

Pre-Trip Craziness

I don't recommend adopting new technology the day before leaving on a trip.  I've wasted a good portion of yesterday and today trying to get my iPhone5 operational.  Verizon suggested I call the call center at 6:00 a.m. this morning in order to be able to get through since they're on overwhelm with the iPhone launch.  So now I've been up since 6:00 a.m. and my old brain is tired!  As well as the old body.  Everything is sorted with Verizon but TracFone is being a jerk about porting my number so I still have to carry that phone as well.  Just what I needed, 2 cell phones!  Can make calls on the iPhone but not receive them.

So my recommendation is if you're ever tempted to do business with TracFone, lie down until the temptation goes away.

Now I need to give some thought to what clothes I'm taking with me, as opposed to all the electronics!  There will be a wide variety of temperatures, so that's making this difficult.  Supposed to be hot in Spokane tomorrow.  And fairly warm in Nelson, B.C.  Then the temps should start to moderate (and probably get downright chilly at night).

Am looking forward to our Canadian Rockies adventure!  Stay tuned.  Allegedly  all our hotels have wi-fi, so I should be able to post.