Quick and Dirty finish up of Banff

So, I don't remember when we did what anymore, or even what all these pictures are of, but I'll take a stab at it.  Oh, and if you just want to see the picts, I think if you click on the first one, you can scroll through the others...

We climbed Telegraph and the next day we climbed Sulfur Mtn.  It really does smell like Sulfur, but not too bad.  That was a MUCH longer hike and it was fun when we got high enough to see the top of Telegraph and realize that we had thought THAT was a big climb!  Katie and I are not fans of cable cars but were tired enough by the time we reached the top, to brave the car back down.  It was fun and not very scary after all.  Or maybe I was just too tired to care.

This might be a photo of Pete and the kids on the way up Sulfur Mtn.

  That night Pete and the kids indulged me and stopped at the Fairmont Hotel to look around at the historic hotel.  It was lovely and had a nice view of the river we were looking at as we hiked all day.

Here are some views from the mountains, including one of the Fairmont:

We found a great place for dinner this night and we hit it again on our way back out of the park after Jasper.  I wish I could remember the name of it.  Coyote Grill maybe?

The next day we headed out to Lake Louise, where we were staying at the Fairmont there.  Everyone else thought the LL one was prettier than the one in Banff, but I liked the Banff one better.

I realized that we would pass Lake Moraine on the way up, so we stopped to look around there before going to Lake Louise.  According to the guide books, some people find Lake Moraine prettier, but I was not overly impressed.  It did become obvious over the course of the trip that I don't find lakes and mountains that interesting overall though, so maybe I'm not the best judge.  Don't get me wrong, they were all beautiful and shockingly blue, but once I've seen them, then I don't need to hang around and stare.

Pete, however, enjoyed them immensely and had a great time hiking around or looking at the many lakes, mountains and glaciers we saw all through the trip.

These are all probably Lake Moraine:

These  could be Lake Moraine, or maybe another lake we stopped at off the highway.  The kids had not spent enough time honing their stone skipping and Pete gave a few lessons on the trip:

 

I know we took pictures at Lake Louise, but I can't seem to find any right now.  It was very pretty and very blue.  We ate lunch one day overlooking the lake and it was very lovely, but also rather busy.  It is a big tourist spot.

That day Zack and I had had enough of big steep hikes.  We started up the tea house trail with Pete and Katie, but were both bitching and moaning and basically making Pete miserable.  I suggested that he go on alone and Katie decided to join him.  Again, I know there is a beautiful picture of Katie having tea at the top, but can't find it.  Will add later if I do.  

Zack and I walked around the lake for a while and went back to hang at the hotel.  My feet appreciated the time off.

DAY 6

This is when I really started to enjoy the trip.   It turns out I am a holes in the ground and running water girl.  We headed out of Banff and up the Icefields Parkway toward Jasper.  Lots of mountains and lakes, very pretty:

Views of glaciers-meh--

But also, Althabasca Falls and other falls that I forget the name of--yay!  The family indulged my love of rivers and canyons and we hiked down to the river of...I can't remember the name of it...but very fun, loud and beautiful!:

Look how happy I am!

We also saw some wildlife, although, despite what the guidebooks said, it was pretty scarce.  We even tried backroads and doubling back.  :(

I did see a black bear for a second, but not long enough to alert the rest of the family. :( :(

We stayed at a great little cabin campsite in Jasper.  We all liked Jasper more than the uber-commercial Banff and if we ever go back, I would definitely fly into Edmonton spend more time there and skip Banff and Calgary.  I think this night Pete and I went back out to get some food since our cabin had a kitchen.   We got lucky and saw a coyote!

The shopping went strangely.  We had to pack lunches for the glacier hike the next day and wanted something to make for dinner one of the nights we were there.  The food prices were killing us on this trip.  But I guess the main grocery store had closed early that night, so we were shopping in a convenience store.  I found tunafish, but no mayo or may just a huge jar, so we asked if we could have some packets and the nice clerk gave us a ton of them, free!  Plenty for tunafish sandwiches--score!

I didn't realize is that the Athabasca Glacier is about half way btw Banff and Jasper.  I was under the impression it was much closer to Jasper, so the next day we had a good ride back down the Icefields Pkwy to get to the glacier where we had booked a guided hike up the glacier.  The closer I got, the more scared I became.  I kept hoping I would be disqualified for some reason and not have to go.  I kept my cool though, so that the kids wouldn't back out of the climb.  I knew this could be a once in a lifetime adventure for them and judging from the melt markers on the road, certainly this glacier will be gone in their lifetime. 

I have never been so terrified for so long (3 hours) in my life and I will never climb a glacier ever again. BUT--I was pretty proud of myself for not having a complete freak out.  I did get pretty close and tears were shed.

The camera ran out of juice not too far into the hike, so not many pictures.  Here's a lovely little sink hole that goes a good 500K down to the bottom of the glacier.  These can open up at any time, so it's wise to follow directly in the footsteps of the person in front of you.

The guide chiseled in a little step at the side of this one so you could hold his hand and lean out over it.  I declined, but you can see Pete and the guide's shadows.

It's much more beautiful in person and there is water flowing into it so it sounds lovely too.

Back up to Jasper and I think we ate dinner in the room this night and went down into town for ice cream.  Pete was pooped and grouchy, next time he'll stay in the room for some privacy and a nap!  The ice cream was good though.

Next day on our way back down, we stopped in Johnston Canyon.  I loved this--woody climbing, a river, a tiny cave and lots of waterfalls!

 

I don't have a picture here, but there are a lot of wooden walkways built along the canyon walls and they we very echo-y.  I enjoyed belting out Oklahoma! to see how much I could embarrass Katie and Zack and they did not disappoint!

Back to just outside Banff and a trip to the hot springs.  Phew!  Smelly sulfur!  The warm water was great and strangely buoyant.  They are outside so you are warm in the water but freezing out of it.  We stayed a while, it was pretty crowded.  Worth the visit.

My hair smelled of sulfur for the next week.  The bathing suits took 3 washings to lose it and most of the rest of the cloths in the suitcase had a bit of a sulfur smell as well.

Back to Calgary for the night before catching the flight back home.  We passed the Olympic park again so drove around it to take a look.  The only things we could really see were the ski jumps and part of a bobsled track but it was interesting.

So, all in all a memorable trip.  Good thing, since I took so long to update this blog!!

Next up--Universal and couldn't stay away from Disney.



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Banff/Jasper pt 2

Well, sure enough--there WAS a draft hanging there in the drafts folder.  So, here it is in all its unedited glory.  Sheesh, at least I'm not crazy,  I knew I'd written more about that trip.



BACKING UP
Back to Day 2--Completely forgot about Moraine Lake!

The first real hike.

We had breakfast in the room and then planned to hike Tunnel Mountain.  Sadly, there isn't a tunnel on the mountain, but there was supposed to be, thus the name.

It was a moderate hike and a good chance for Pete and me to get used to our new hiking poles.  We took a nice scenic route to get to the trailhead, stopping along the way to take in the views even from the foothills.

We stopped here on the way to the trailhead, without realizing that it was right below us and we'd end up crossing this road again to get up the mtn

The view BEFORE climbing!

 The hike was challenging enough.  We took it easy, knowing that there was a LOT more hiking coming up on this trip so no need to push it.  Everyone's shoes worked out well and I had mixed feelings about the poles.  Great to have when I wanted them and a hassle to carry around when I didn't.  Still, important to save my knees overall.

This was on the way up.

 There are a lot of signs along the route warning you not to throw anything off the sides of the mountain.  Here's why:

Just before the top, we notice this person, taking a slightly more challenging route than ours ;-)

 We made it!

And then, ofcourse, we had to climb down.  We had brought a large bag of trail mix and plenty of water but were pretty famished when we got back down.

Went into Banff for lunch and the guide book suggested the Eddie Burger Bar. Sounded like our kind of place.  Lots of good burgers, from Bison to Veggie and gluten free buns!  We ordered up and waiting for our drinks.  Then we waited some more.  Drinks came.  We waited.  And waited and-well, you get the idea.  It took over an hour to get our food.  Then, we discovered that in Canada all beef is cooked well done.  I don't mean done well, I mean dead dry as a bone done.  The prices were exorbitant and the food was beyond disappointing.  EXCEPT- for the poutine.  Amazing Canadian gravy cheese fries that almost made the wait worth it.  OMG I could live on those.

Back to the room for some hang time.

The Banff Trip pt 1

This was Pete's trip.  He has long dreamed of spending time in the Canadian Rockies and it was about time we got him there.  Plus, if you want to hike on a glacier, you'd better get to it!

I'm not so much for mountains (see post on the holes in the ground trip--that's me).  Don't get me wrong, they're beautiful but then I've seen them and lose interest.  Pete is much better about going on trips that I want to take that he's not as interested in.  I am kind of a pain in the butt.  I did do better as we went along and I think it was because I just didn't care for the town of Banff and it didn't help me to enjoy the trip.  Once we got out of Banff I had a better time and was surely better to be around.  Definitely some work for me to do on myself about letting others enjoy what they enjoy while being pleasant while they do it.  :-/

Day 1 (Sept 1)
Up for an extremely early flight to Calgary.  I don't like early flights but I do enjoy having a whole day at my destination.  I forget though, that the rest of the family is then exhausted the next day and I have to deal with being someplace with snoozers.  Have to re-think this plan for future trips.

Driving through Calgary to  get to the hotel reminded me so much of Fort Worth.  It really is a cow town.  I don't know why I was surprised by this, since the stampede is a major event there.  So I was very glad that I had changed our original plan from staying the next day in Calgary and instead heading to Banff right away.

It happened to be some kind of open gallery day in Calgary, so after window shopping, especially at the Fluvog store, we tooled around the galleries munching on chocolates and chatting with the owners.  Somewhere in there we stopped at a book store.  I had forgotten all of my guide books and most of my notes (duh) and wanted to get a little book to help out my memory.  I got Frommer's Banff & the Rockies Day by Day and it was just what I needed.

The Marriott was great.  Got the room on my points and the gold level concierge lounge was terrific.  Free dinner with shrimp, pasta, plenty of veggies for Pete and dessert.  We were pretty beat and not having to go out for dinner was perfect for us.  Not all the Marriotts have a lounge, so this was my first time being spoiled and it was great!

Pete was really fascinated with this building.

The Calgary Tower, right next to our hotel.

Day 2
Breakfast in the lounge and a fairly leisurely morning before heading off to Banff.  None of us were especially interested in sight seeing in Calgary so figured we'd head out into the mountains.

Got to Banff in the afternoon and bought a 6 day pass, as advised by the staffer at the gate to the park.  Canadian National Parks are very different from the US parks (at least the ones I've seen so far).  There is a town site inside the park with shops and homes.  Hotels are outrageously expensive, the park service doesn't oversee pricing at all.  So it was strange to pay to enter the park but then feel like I was driving into a resort town.

I think we checked into the hotel first.  The Banff Rocky Mountain Resort.  Just what we wanted.  Out of the bustle of town and a surprisingly large room with a fridge and free wifi.  We basically dropped our stuff and headed into town to stop in at the visitors center and grab lunch.

The visitors center was nice and we got some good advice on how to handle bears, which freaked Zack out a bit, but not as much info or advice on moderate trails to try.  Good thing we had researched in our guide books before getting there and I picked up my little Frommer's book.

To the Coyotes Grill for lunch. Great food but over the moon prices--we THOUGHT, that was before all the other mediocre meals we had during the rest of the trip, all at exorbitant prices.  We decided it would be a good idea to stop in at a grocery store and pick up breakfast, lunch and snack supplies.  We did this at some point, but have waited too long after the trip to write this and I've forgotten a lot of the details.

We headed back to the room after lunch where everyone (but me) fell asleep and slugged around for the rest of the day.  See, this is where the early morning flight of the day before backfired on me. I was antsy and eager to go see stuff, but I begrudgingly yielded to the will of the rest of the family.

 Up and back to Banff townsite for dinner.  Pete found a really reasonable place that served sushi and large bowls of soup.  The waitress brought my late-in-coming soup with a wonderful sing song of thank you for waiting won ton sou-oup!  Which made us all smile.

I think it was as we stepped out of the room to go to dinner, we noticed a few people standing outside our door and realized they had spotted some deer across the street.  We all ran over to grab some photos of our first wildlife encounter!

OK, it's possible this happened the next day, but I don't think so...

Next Up--Day 3