Canada Day, 2000

We drove Mr. T.'s parents to Lake Louise, there were lots of visitors, many tour busses, RV’s (Those big self-driven campers). Dad took a photo; they had their own parking area, as many as you can fit in the shot. People wore small Canadian flags in their hair and hats. (I will do that next year) We also visited Moraine Lake for the first time. My Dad was very impressed with the Rockies, he didn’t know they were so large. Here it was 12 degrees.

Then we drove up to the Ice –fields to the Attabasca Glazier close to Jasper. We saw other smaller glaziers on our way there. We crossed the Saskatchewan River. Unfortunately it rained up there and was cold, 4 degrees, but we were prepared being Canadians. Ma and Pa stayed inside the car, as it was a steep climb. The sign says it is like climbing 15 flights of stairs (300m). There are signs along the road about 80 m apart showing where the Glazier was in 1932, 1945, 1952, 1982,etc.

We walked onto the glacier, which is a bit yellow, but not too hard, one is warned not to walk there, as there are crevices. Someone had fallen in, a few years ago, but froze to death before being saved. Where the glazier had been, nothing green, but there were lovely rocks, we picked up some pebbles. The larger rocks are scratched on the surface as the glazier moved over it. One can ride over the glazier with a special bus, but we didn’t as there were many tourists and the weather there was rainy.

Then we headed to Banff, where we had planned to have lunch at Joe’s Diner, but they had a parade and the town was chock a block, so we might return another day. We returned via the Minawanka loop and Johnson’s lake. We didn’t do Johnson’s canyon.

Tokeloshe