Canadian Rockies

Banff National Park

06.09.2006 26 °C

Hello again,

We have finally managed to sort the Banff pictures ready for upload, so here goes our Banff experience..

Arriving in Banff we realised that it was much hotter then we expected. I am actually thinking I will be getting the sun tan I did not get all summer in Malta!! :p We were also surprised by the location of Banff... it is completeley surrounded by mountains. You go out of a shop and all around you see mountains and flowers... and wildlife!

The place is too pretty to describe and photos do not do it justice. This is true for most of the places we have visited here.

The day after arriving in Banff we drove off to Moraine Lake. This is the prettiest lake we have yet seen:

We took a stroll to climb up a rockpile to get a view from the top... and oh!!! What a view! I guess the nicest thing about this lake was that there were not too many people around.

After leaving Moraine Lake we drove a short distance to Lake Louise, which is the more famous lake of the area. Altough it is also pretty, there were just too many tourists so we went away quickly. (We were also very hungry and food from near the lake was too pricey!) These are some shots:

We went back to Banff and ate a hot rock lunch at 'The Grizzly bear'... with chocolate fondue for desert... and guess what! They use toblerone chocolate for fondue just like I do at home. Mark and I were amazed!!

After lunch we went up on a Gondola (cable car) to Sulphur Mountain. It had an elevation of around 7000ft.

Going down, the Gondola stopped in mid-air for 5 hearth wrenching minutes... the look on my face in the last photo below shows how happy I was during the wait. Mark was bemused at my anxiety.

The next day we departed for Jasper. Still within the Banff national park we visited Johnston canyon. In the area there are several waterfalls. We walked for 3 hours to view them all, but it was well worth it!

After the long walk up and down valleys we decided we deserved a good lunch. We found this beautiful and relaxing place which was an old railway station. Trains still pass on the rails next to the restaurant. And it was not even too expensive even though it was next to Lake Louise!!

All in all, we were sorry to leave Banff… but then we got to Japer and it was a whole new experience. Watch this space for bears and more. Coming soon!