Day 8 Report

Sorry for missing a day… time got away from us as we adjusted plans on the fly in response to the realities of the Banff area. We’re sure you’ve been absolutely salivating to know what we’ve been doing. We know we promised a two for one, but it’s a late, I’m tired, and I can’t upload anything so we’ll try get caught up again over the next day or so…

We woke up in Calgary, packed-up our clean laundry and left our AirBNB with a mission on our mind: clean our car! If you’ve paid attention to the photos we’ve posted, you’ll know that Katja, our VW Golf R, has eaten more than her share of bugs crossing the prairies. So much so that at least one unnamed bird was picking carcasses off of her front bumper as a nice snack. We found a coin-operated wash operation and after $13 worth of soap and power washer time, she actually looked clean!

From there, we set off towards the Banff/Lake Louise area where we weren’t 100% sure how many of our plans would materialize given the horror stories we had heard from Albertans about the holiday weekend traffic and construction in the area. To some extent, they were right to warn us.

The drive out of Calgary started poorly as a rear-ender on the TCH had us caught in gridlock for about 40 mins. We used the time to sort out a problem we had redeeming our PetroPoints. Once free of the snarl, we made good time and soon started seeing mountains through the windshield!

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Soon enough, we arrived at Banff National Park gates and purchased a two-day park pass before continuing on to the town of Banff. Going into town was a mistake. Picture the south-side of Mont-Tremblant at its worst for congestion. This was almost as bad, but then we made it worse, we tried to buy some groceries at the local IGA. Not only were the parking spots sized so that a VW Golf looked huge, the number of spots was limited and the access roads to them were much too narrow for most mid-size cars, let alone the trucks and SUVs that were circling looking for a spot. Odd that city folks like us would find more crowd-related problems in a tiny mountain village.

Eventually, we got out of there and hit the Bow Valley Parkway. It runs along the Bow River between Banff and Lake Louise. It proved pretty congested and most of the peaks were obscured by trees, so we switched back to the TCH at our first opportunity and continued north, reaching the starting point of the Ice Fields Parkway.

We weren’t sure if we were going to bother with the drive to Jasper and we had certainly heard a mix of opinions from friends and colleagues so we ended up deciding to go as far as the Columbia Icefields instead of all the way to the town of Jasper. The trip, which saw us go as far as Tangle Creek Falls, just after the Columbia Icefields, was totally worth the time and fuel.

The video below is time-lapse of snippets of our southbound trip. It plays at about 8 times normal speed.

The views were amazing. Yes, there are mountains everywhere, but this place seemed different. Perhaps it was the grey skies, whipping wind, and general fact that were we Rocky Mountain virgins, but we were both in awe.

Getting close to the Athabasca Glacier at the Columbia Icefield Discovery Centre was another revelation! The cooling effect this mass of ice had on the surrounding environment was painful as the wind passing over it was so cold, it made you want long pants, gloves, and hat. The poor tourists from warm countries were wrapped in all manner of apparel trying to stay warm. We were bummed we couldn’t touch the glacier.

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Honestly, we could not stop taking photos, which was particularly hard for me as every corner presented a new photo op or a new perspective on peak already captured. We simply didn’t have the time to stop at every opportunity, even though the return trip took place during that ideal sunset lighting. Even hurrying a little bit, we didn’t make it to our overnight until 10:45PM. Still, this was the most visually stunning environment we’ve ever experienced. Granted, we could have skipped the delicious meal we had at Altitude Restaurant, located in the Columbia Icefield Discovery Centre, and focused on photos, but this is a vacation, not work.

We were spending the night in Golden, BC, so the last 40km of our drive was after dark, which provided a whole new feel for the area.

Bottom Line? If you’re on the fence about the drive, the answer is simple: DO EEET!