Jasper

 

Hi everyone!

 

On Monday, we left Banff and drove to Jasper along the Icefields Parkway. First we stopped at the Bow Summit. We hiked up to the lookout, and along the way it was so hard to breathe because we were up so high in the mountains. I was impressed that some oldies were doing it! Even I was struggling! From the lookout we saw Peyto Lake which was gorgeous. If you look closely, the lake is kind of shaped like the head of a wolf side-on, with two ears and it's mouth.

 

 

Along the way we saw the Saskatchewan Valley and Bridal Veil Falls, which were pretty lame after seeing the impressive Takakkaw Falls the day before. We then stopped at the Columbia Icefield and Athabasca Glacier, which were so awesome. We hiked up to as close as we could get to the glacier. I thought that we would be able to get closer and touch the glacier, but the barrier stopped us, bummer. It was extremely windy and freezing being so close to the glacier. There were signs that showed where the glacier was in previous years, and it has receded remarkably. It won't be here in 100 years.

 

 

Continuing along the Icefields Parkway we saw the Stutfield Glacier. We stopped for a picnic lunch at a place called Bubbling Springs. It was a small open area with a few picnic tables, close to a pond of water which had sand at the bottom. If you just stood and watched the springs, the sand and water bubbled by itself. It was so weird and interesting, and we had no idea what caused it, but it was cool!

 

 

 

Closer to Jasper, we stopped to see the Sunwapta Falls which were cool.

 

 

We then looked at the Athabasca Falls which were pretty impressive! You could get pretty close to the falls and get sprayed :) We like the action of waterfalls like these. Can you see me and Mum on the little balcony?

 

 

We then arrived in the town of Jasper, and checked out the main streets in downtown, before heading to the Jasper Pizza Place for dinner.

 

Yesterday I had Cap'n Crunch cereal for breakfast, then we headed to the Jasper Tramway. We bought our tickets and we were assigned to "flight" #11 and were "boarding" in half an hour. They tried to make it seem like an airport and a flight.. but really it was just a gondola going up to a mountain. The tramway was all standing, and they squeezed about 20 people into each one! We went to the top of Whistlers Mountain (not to be confused with the famous Whistler Mountain in British Columbia). There was lots of rocks and boulders at the top of the mountain. It has great views of Jasper, the Canadian Rockies, and the Athabasca River.

 

 

While we were up there we saw a pika, which is kind of like a squirrel but without a tail. In this photo, you can see it running!

 

 

We headed back down the tramway then drove to Patricia Lake which was so gorgeous, with amazing relfections of the mountains.

 

 

We then went to Pyramid Lake which wasn't as impressive, and much darker because of the clouds.

 

 

Our sightseeing continued as we went to the Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge which is a fancy hotel. We looked around then saw the golf course. From a distance we saw a female deer but it darted away quickly when a golf buggy drove past. At that time, a storm started rolling in. We went to Edith Lake, where we stopped for photos. We were going to have our lunch out by the water but it was raining and the mosquitoes were out in full force so we stayed inside the car. On the way back we stopped for a quick photo at Lake Annette.

 

We then did the drive up to Miette Hot Springs to hopefully see wildlife along the main road. We saw two male elk along the road, but they were on the other side and it was hard to get photos. We saw a herd of bighorn sheep on the side of the mountain (which happen to look more like goats).

 

 

We reached the Hot Springs but just turned around and came back down to the main road so we could see more wildlife. On the way back down we played I Spy with my Little Eye :) We didn't see much wildlife on the way back. We relaxed at the hotel for a bit then waited out the front of our hotel to be picked up for our wildlife tour. Our tour guide, Joe, was amazing. He was so full of knowledge, not only about the animals, but also about the Jasper and Canadian Rockies area. He knew all the great spots to go to to see wildlife. He was so funny and told really interesting stories. There were 6 other people on our bus, and he made sure not to fill the bus so that everyone got a window seat, which was great :) On our tour we saw a female elk, a herd of elk with a young male, three bald eagles, a female coyote and her three cubs, a woodpecker, a couple of blue herron birds, and a male elk (whose size and antlers were huge!). The male elk was the most popular. Many tourists pulled their cars over and got out of their cars, and quite a few people were actually getting dangerously close to the elk. Joe was telling us how the elk could turn aggressive very quickly and charge them, but luckily that didn't happen. Here's some good photos of some animals from the tour:

 

 

 

There was a sad point of the tour though. We saw a female bighorn sheep who had been hit by a car and was dead on the road :( Her two baby lamb were so lost and confused, and were nuzzling their mother. It was so heartbreaking and sad to watch, it almost made me and Mum cry. The lamb kept dashing across the road, making us so nervous they were going to get hit. Eventually they stayed on one side of the road. Joe (our tour guide) handled the situation so well. He moved the dead mother off the road then called Parks Canada to deal with it while we continuted our tour. In happier news, we saw some bighorn sheep on the rocks, a beaver dam and a beaver lodge (no beavers though, they're nocturnal). Here's a photo of the beaver dam:

 

 

During the tour, the storm was on and off, and we ended up seeing about 4 rainbows, one of which was super bright! They were so pretty :)

 

 

Joe ended up extending our tour for another 15 minutes just to make sure we got to see a bear. And we did! We saw a black bear. He was a fair distance away in the woods though, but it was still awesome. While we were watching the bear, we saw a person jogging that way, then they saw the bear and turned around and jogged back the way they came, which was pretty funny.

 

 

 

We got dropped off at our hotel, then went to A&W, a Canadian fast food joint, for takeaway dinner, which for fast food was actually pretty good.

 

More blogging to come! I miss you guys!

 

Love,

Emily