Canadian Rockies

Sat July 14- Just like when we visited Glacier National Park three years ago, we started our day with an excellent breakfast at the Park Cafe in St. Mary, Montana. A great little place with some good memories! Feeling sad that we were missing out on Glacier (surprisingly for a year long trip- just not enough time), we continued on to Banff. At the Canadian border there was a a car with a Massachusetts license plate right in front of us. Small world... The drive was fine, little drizzle, we stopped at an information center to upload the previous blog-entry and arrived in Banff in the late afternoon. We got a camp-site for two nights, set-up the tent and went to Banff center for a nice beer, pizza and salad dinner (actually had dinner there 2 days in a row...)

On the mountain in Banff

 

Sun July 15- Had a nice lazy Sunday-morning (even though we had no clue what day it was, or even what day it is now...) and did some internet at the local Starbucks. After grocery shopping for our Lake O'Hara trip, we did a short hike to the top of a nearby hill. Cloudy, but still a nice view of the town and nearby mountains. Coming down the mountain it started to rain, our first real rain of the trip! We drove back to the campsite and picked up some tickets for a Banff Mountain Film Festival showing later that evening. Back at the campsite we prepared for our Lake O'Hara trip under our rain tarp (we were wondering if we were ever going to use it!).

LB at All Souls above Lake O'Hara

 

Mon July 16- Day 1 Lake O'Hara- Got up early to catch our 8:30am school bus to Lake O'Hara in Yoho National Park, about 1 hour north-west of Banff. Thanks to Shelley (LB's mom) we booked one of the 30 campsites exactly three months ago. Lake O'Hara can be reached by an 11 km (Canada is metric) dirt road, but this road is not for public use... except if you want to hike in. A bus takes day-hikers and campers to the lake and there is limited seating so you have to reserve. We arrived to a beautiful campground, received the campground instructions, setup our tent and went for a hike. We hiked the first section of the All Souls alpine route and were rewarded with great views of the turquoise colors of Lake O'Hara. We continued on to Lake McArthur (still frozen in mid July) and then looped back to the campsite. We relaxed, read a book, had dinner with wine at the communal campfire and chatted with a lot of Canadians (our theory is that since you need to reserve it so far in advance, locals know better than tourists.. but of course there were still Dutch people there as well..)

LB at Lake O'Hara in the evening ( last one )

 

Tue July 17- Day 2 Lake O'Hara- We hiked the "alpine circuit" around Lake O'Hara. It was absolutely amazing! The hike started up Wiwaxy Pass, via Lake Oesa, then continued to Opabin Lake and returned back to Lake O'Hara (more for personal recollection than anything else..) If you have nice weather and 1 day at Lake O'Hara, this is your hike. Steep drop-offs which were sometimes a little scary, and Maurits had to assist LB on some snow-crossings- but all worth it for the stunning views! Back at camp we enjoyed the additional pasta that we now add to the "instant freeze dried packaged add boiling water wait 10 minutes and voila" meals. Later that evening we had a very interesting ranger talk on the Burgess Shale (which is in Yoho National Park). Burgess Shale are very rare 505-million-year-old fossils from right after the Cambrium Explosion. These fossils have taught the non-creationists a lot about evolution. Fascinating stuff and worth some more exploring. We walked back to our tent in the rain, where we enjoyed having our tarp once again.

On the alpine trail

Wiwaxy pass

 

The tiny specks on the bottom right are people on the trail

 

Wed July 18- we took the 930am bus back to the car (no need to reserve the bus out). It had rained all night and we had done the hikes we wanted to do at Lake O'Hara...so time to move on. After a short stop at Lake Louise we decided to continue further to Jasper. There is a lot more to explore in Yoho and the Lake Louise area, but unfortunately not enough time.. In Jasper we setup camp just outside the town, had a much needed shower and went to the visitor center. We were thinking of doing the Skyline trail, but the trail was fully booked and the ranger was not too excited about the Skyline trail to begin with. He was very excited about the Berg Lake Trail in Mt Robson Provincial Park and convinced us to go there. Using the free wifi at the visitor center we booked for three nights on the Berg Lake Trail. (We give a lot of credit to the Canadian tourism bureau- most visitor centers have free wifi and that makes life soooo much easier.) Then it was about time for a beer at the local brew pub. The Red Sox were winning...

Snow field crossing

Maurits had to jump on the iceberg...

Thu July 19- It was a beautiful day and we wanted to go on a long day-hike, but we had too many things to take care of. We did some internet, organized our health insurance, bought a GREAT bug-net (that we are sitting in as this is being written) and most important of all we bought our around-the-world ticket! Luckily we did have time to go on a surprisingly nice 2-hour walk in the foothills of Jasper (forgot the name, but it is hike no. 1 on the Jasper day-hike map). After preparing for Berg Lake we had dinner in our fabulous bug-net, no mosquitos! What did walk by was a very large herd of female elk, what a sight! Right in our campground! However one of the elk did not like Maurits and charged at him...TWICE! (completely unprovoked.... it was so strange) Luckily nobody got hurt, but scary! We need bear spray...

Before the Elk-Attack

 

Fri July 20- Day 1 Berg Lake- Drove 1 hour west to Mount Robson Provincial Park where we arrived the same time we left (we migrated to the pacific time zone). We got our permit, watched skipped a mandatory backcountry video, organized our bags and started the Berg Lake trail. The weather in the parking lot was superb, clear skies and a beautiful view of Mount Robson. As we progressed on the 22 km trail it got cloudier, humid, and stayed very hot. We saw some big waterfalls as we climbed the 800 vertical meters of the steepest section of the trail. With our heavy packs we were happy to arrive at the Rearguard campsite. Beautiful camp spot, close to Berg Lake, great view of the Berg Glacier and Mt Robson looming high above us.

Mt Robson from the car park

Mt Robson from the tent with Berg Lake and Berg Glacier

 

Sat July 21- Day 2 Berg Lake- After a damp night, we woke up to a glorious mist. Not much to see... Had a morning coffee in the tent as it drizzled on and off, then we relaxed and read a book. Around noon it cleared a little bit so we went for a half-day walk up to Mumm Basin. After a steep climb we got to a plateau that despite the clouds gave a great view of Berg Lake. Had lunch on a point that overlooks Jasper National Park, then walked via a waterfall back to our campsite. The weather got a little better, we had dinner and sat in between the millions of lovely smelling wild-flowers in the flood-basin just steps from our tent.

Rainbow

Sun July 22- Day 3 Berg Lake- Nice morning, clouds on top of Mt Robson, but good enough for our hike to Snowbird Pass. Early in the hike we got rained on, but after a beautiful rainbow, the clouds got fewer and fewer. According to the park ranger in Jasper, Snowbird Pass is the best day hike in all of the Rockies. We were not so sure about that, but it was a spectacular hike! We hiked past Robson Glacier, up to a gorgeous alpine meadow and then to the pass. The pass was snow covered and had a steep drop-off on the other side. Two beautiful views; one looking back to Mt Robson and the other looking out to a massive snow field/glacier with mountains in the background. Wow! We enjoyed the view, had lunch and hiked back. What a great day! Back at camp we had dinner under our bug-net, which resulted in some jealous looks from our fellow campers...

LB on Snowbird pass

 

Maurits looking out...

 

Mon July 23- Day 4 Berg Lake- It rained during the night and when we got up it was very cloudy, but dry. We packed up, had breakfast and started the hike back to the car. Then the rain started.. Heavy rain at times, very windy in the open, many flashes and thunders. All in all very comfortable hiking weather! No bugs, not too hot and knowing that we were going back to the car made it very enjoyable. We did feel sorry for the many ill prepared kids that were hiking in: walking in sneakers, sleeping bags sticking out of backpacks... We had lunch at one of the shelters where there was a nice fire going... packed with people, but a good rest-stop. By the time we got back to the car we were absolutely soaked and so was all our stuff... perfect time to splurge on a hotel room! Through the visitors center we reserved a room in Prince George, BC which was a 3 hour drive north-west. In our usual high pace: we checked-in, found a laundromat, hung all the clean but wet clothes in our hotel room, set the AC to max, found a good sushi place that was open late (it was 930pm by then) and then finally enjoyed the bed with clean cotton sheets.

 

LB looking out on Robson Glacier and Mountain

 

Hiking home...

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