After we left our Jasper campground we headed for Lake Louise & Banff along the Icefields Hwy – so named due to the number of glaciers en route. But we still had one more treat in store – we saw our first & only black wolf of the trip, just out of Jasper. By the time we saw it we were past it, and there was nowhere to turn around, but a bit further down the road we turned our 32’ RV on a sixpence and just hoped the wolf was still in photo range. He was moving pretty fast, but I did manage to get a blurry photo.
Moving right along the Icefields Hwy the camera kept clicking as the hanging glaciers and snow packs seemed to be atop every mountain and were amazing. After all, we were driving along the ridge of the Canadian Rockies. The scenery was stunning. By the time we reached the Columbia Glacier it was drizzling with rain, with grey skies and a cold wind. A nice staff member offered to take a photo of the 4 of us before we escaped to the warmth of our RV’s.
Wills & Kate (Prince William & Princess Catherine) thought the Lake Louise environs were pretty good and worth a visit, so we thought why not? What a mistake to visit Lake Louise on a warm Sunday afternoon of a long weekend. The traffic was murder – bumper to bumper for miles. There was no car park available for a smart car, let alone our RV’s. Thoroughly dismayed, and never wanting to set foot in Lake Louise again we continued SE to Bamff where we were fortunate to find a campsite. Marie provided a tasty dinner and we all crashed early. After a good sleep, we felt refreshed enough to give Lake Louise another chance – Murray secured a late 3pm check out for us, so we left our RV’s behind, jumped in Marie & Eric’s 4 WD and drove out at 8am for the 30 min drive NW to Lake Louise town, and onto the Fairmont Lodge right on the Lake itself. Our perseverance was well rewarded. Hardly any tourists were wandering about, so we celebrated with breakfast in the lodge dining room, overlooking the lake. What a treat. The lake really is pretty. As the time marched on, more tourists marched in, so after checking out the grounds and the lobby, we decided it was time for us to leave.
In Banff we checked out a local waterfall before collecting our RV’s and hightailing it for our new campsite in a satellite town called Cochrane to the west of Calgary. But like Jasper and the wolf farewell, we had a nice surprise as we drove out of Banff – a lovely, young, black bear waved us goodbye before we were 5 mins drive from the campground.
As we drove west along the highway towards Calgary, the views of the Rockies were fantastic. For several kms we drove parallel along a 26 km parkway for non-motorised vehicles stretching east from Banff and west towards Lake Louise - we saw cyclists, walkers, runners and roller bladers out using the path and soaking up the views.
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