Jasper National Park is located high in the northern Rockies. It is a very beautiful and scenic place to visit. We have been here several times before. But this time through it was very smokey with several forest fires burning in and near the park. Like the US, the Canadian Park service just lets them burn. It is the best thing to do for the ecology of the park but it is hard on the views.
On the way into Jasper National Park we came across an interesting mountain that I gave the name of ‘Winking Wendy’.
Jasper NP was established in 1907 and is Canada’s fifth national park and the largest of the parks representing the Rocky Mountain Region. We camped in Jasper NP near the town of Jasper.
Jasper is a colorful town with lots of restaurants and junk shops..I mean gift shops. The town is colorful due to all of the hanging baskets full of flowers. It is more like a village than a town and reminds me of a ski village.
This city has a mascot, Jasper the Bear. This is not the original statue. We were here on our honeymoon 28 years ago and Jasper the Bear was quite different.
The Icefields Parkway starts at Jasper and goes into Banff National Park and ends at Lake Louise. The Parkway quietly opened in 1940 while the country was at war. We spent a day visiting the Columbia Icefield which is midway between Jasper and Lake Louise. This icefield sits in a bowl between several mountain peaks. There are glaciers that spill out between the mountains like waterfalls of ice. The waters from those glaciers go into three different ocean systems; the North Saskatchewan River which goes into Hudson’s Bay and the Atlantic; the Athabasca River which flows into the Bearing Sea; the Columbia River which flows into the Pacific Ocean.
We went out onto the Athabasca Glacier on a snow bus tour. The tour takes you up very high on the glacier to a place where the ice below you is over 1000 feet thick.
Going to and coming back from the Icefield, we stopped at several waterfalls and other viewpoints. A lovely place with lofty mountains and high cliffs, swift flowing rivers and lots of wildlife to see.
Our next stop was Lake Louise. We continued south into Banff National Park and stayed the night at the park campground near Lake Louise. We have visited this place many times before but we thought this was a good half way point through the park. Not so much smoke here, it stayed mostly in the north, the views here were very good. We went up to the lake and famous lodge and touristed around for the afternoon. Sorry, no pictures of Lake Louise. The sun was glaring in the wrong place and any pictures would have been too bright.
Known to the Stoney people as “Lake of Little Fishes”, Lake Louise was given its present name in 1884. It honors Princess Louise Caroline Alberta, the six child of Queen Victoria.
On the next day we left Alberta and headed southbound for Kootenay National Park and stopped near Radium Hot Springs on the eastern border of British Columbia. The weather is warming up as we get closer to central BC and out of the Rockies. Just an overnight stop here then we head west to Nelson BC.
The hot, dry summer of 2003 was Kootenay National Park’s most active fire season in living memory. Two large, lightning-caused fires eventually merged and burned 12.6% of the park. The drive through this park was nice and scenic, but you can see a lot of the destruction that this last fire did to the park. There is new growth starting, but the destruction is still very evident, even after 6 years.
During our travels throughout Alaska and Canada, we have noticed a lot of wildlife warning signs that not only warn you of wildlife but give you the number of wildlife that have been killed in the area.
September 1 – 3, 2009 – SOUTHERN BRITISH COLUMBIA
Many years ago we visited Nelson and found it to be quite charming so we thought we would visit it again since we were passing through the area. An old iron and silver mining town, Nelson was settled by prospectors in the late 1880’s. With the depletion of its mines, the town turned to logging, sawmilling and area trade. Nelson is another of those turn of the century mining towns that has retained and restored a lot of their old Victorian stone buildings. The down town area is a trip back into the past with lots of shops and restaurants. The town was used as a backdrop a several years ago in the Steve Martin film “Roxanne”. We stayed in Castlegar, about 25 miles away, but we spent most of our time in Nelson exploring the city and shopping. We met the town character, Izzy, having a nice lazy day in the window of a bookstore.
It was a dark and stormy day when we left the Nelson area and headed west hugging the US border. Traveling on Highway 3 in the pouring rain, we again climbed mountains and into valleys. We finally broke through the rain and we were driving through an area called Regal Ridge which looked like an area where estates might be built. What was interesting were the bronze statues that were set up at certain points. I was only able to get a few pictures. I missed the one of Sasquatch.
We passed through the town of Osoyoos and through some very scenic country full of vineyards and orchards. We passed many fruit stands, but sadly we could not stop and get any fresh fruit. It would all be taken away from us when we crossed into the US.
We stayed the night in Hope, a city we visited on our way into British Columbia, and departed for the border the next day. We will spend a few days visiting our friends in Gig Harbor and then travel the coast of Oregon into California. We will be home in less than a week.
Stay tuned for Vol 9 – The Pacific Northwest.
