The Final Leg of Our Journey

 May 12 - Back on the train to Vancouver, BC

 

Temperature around 10° with a few clouds.  This will change as the day goes on as Vancouver is forecasting rain all day!

 

Our bus arrived to get us back to the train for our 460 km journey.  We said good bye to our luggage one last time.  Hopefully it will be in our hotel room when we get to Vancouver!

 

Last night we actually looked at Alaska cruises leaving from Vancouver this weekend, but the only ones available were one way northbound, which would have made our return flight arrangements from Anchorage a bit complicated!  This trip was nice, but we felt like it went by way too quickly!  If there had been a 7 day round trip cruise from Vancouver I would have been twisting Mary’s arm!  (Note to self - always add a second trip if the first one is short!  LOL) 

 

Today we are on 1st seating for meals

 

We are winding our way around Lake Kamloops and then we turn southbound and follow the Thompson River to where it meets the Fraser near Lytton.  Along the side of the tracks we saw osprey nests, more hoodoos, and on the mountain sides for many kms were the trees destroyed by the fires.

 

Osprey Nests

 

More Hoodoos!

 

Trees burned in last year’s fires covered the hills near Lytton

 

Always something to see…

 

Cisco Crossing 

and Rainbow Canyon

 

At Lytton, the town that was completely destroyed by fires last year we saw the confluence of the clear Thompson and muddy Fraser Rivers. We’ll now be following the Fraser as it winds its way to the Pacific Ocean.

 

After lunch we came into the Fraser Valley, a lush garden area. Huge blueberry fields could be seen on either side of the train.  

 

As we approached Chilliwack and the Mission area it started to rain!  It looks like that will accompany us all the way into Vancouver. 

 

Rail traffic has picked up.  Because longer trains have the right of way, we have had to move to a side rail a couple of times, slowing our trip to Vancouver.

 

We pulled into the Rocky Mountaineer Station around 5:30 where buses were waiting to take us to our hotel. It has been another great journey to tuck away in our Memory Books!

 

See you soon!

The Happy Travellers

 

All Aboard!

May 11- On the train heading for Kamloops, BC

 

Lake Louise: Temp 2° , brisk

 

Starting out from Lake Louise the bus took us to the train station in Lake Louise, a small depot where we met the train coming from Banff.  This train has 17 cars and three locomotives to manage all the inclines between Banff and Revelstoke.   Tomorrow there will only be two as we make our way to the coast. 

 

We crossed the continental divide which separates the Pacific and Atlantic watersheds at an elevation of 1626 m ( just over 1 mile) We had to move our clocks back one hour as we entered BC.

 

The first highlight of this route was the Spiral Tunnels.  The route originally had a grade of 4.5% which cost a lot in repairs and operational expenses.  In 1907 it was decided to build these tunnels modelled after a tunnel system in Switzerland; this allowed the grade to be reduced to 2.2%. The upper tunnel turns about 290°, and emerges 16 m higher than its entrance. The lower spiral turns approximately 230° and emerges about 17 m higher than its entrance.

 

The railway actually doubles back on itself twice, although you don’t have a sense that the train is turning inside the dark tunnels. But it is an amazing feat to cut down the grade passing through these mountains!

 

Farther along our route, near Notch Hill, we came to Horseshoe Curve where the train turned about 210° so we could see how much we actually turned back at the Spiral Tunnels!  In the photo, the front of the train can be seen already around the Horseshoe Curve!

 

We were able to see Rogers Pass off in the distance; this is a structure built to protect the roadway from avalanches.

 

Stonemason Bridge, another bridge built to avoid avalanches.

 

As we travelled west it was remarkable to see how the conditions had changed from yesterday.  In Banff National Park it was cold, snowing and windy in places!  In early afternoon today we passed green fields, dandelions, and trees already leafed out!  It’s spring in BC!!

 

The rest of the trip was uneventful - except, I guess, for the meals!!  We had second seating.  The meals are beautifully presented, generous, and delicious!

 

Breakfast…

 

                                                 Lunch…

                                                                                               Snacks! 

 

We arrived in Kamloops and by the time we got to our hotel,  the Sandman Signature Hotel it was 8:00 PM  There are two bus loads of people arriving at the same time, and the luggage had just arrived at the same time, so it may take a while to get that all sorted out! We have an early start tomorrow, so we need to get to sleep soon!!

 

On to Vancouver tomorrow!:

 

Stay tuned!

 

The Train Travellers

  

Our Big Adventure

 May 10 - Lake Louise, Alberta

 

Weather: overcast, 2°, light snow flurries!

 

Today we are going to the Columbia Icefields.  One of the main reasons we decided to do this route on the RM was to see the Icefields as our excursion there was cancelled on our trip last September.  I know it will be shocking to see the Athabaskan Glacier and how much it has receded since I was here with Con in the 1980’s!

 

It was a long walk from where the bus parked to the actual skywalk, but as we approached the entrance I discovered that they offered ‘VIP’ service via wheelchair!  I happily accepted the offer and was able to have the experience!

 

Getting to the skywalk one of the guides gave short presentations about the wildlife, birds, and geology.  We were almost 300 m above the valley floor on a glass walkway!   Yikes!!! Hopefully this short videoclip will give you a feel for what it was like!                   

                    Glacier Skywalk 

Mary is always so adventurous!

 

But Dorothy is a bit more of a wimp!

 Such spectacular views!

 

Our next stop was the Athabaskan Glacier.  It has receded so much!  It is really quite shocking. 

 

The vehicles are huge and hold about 40-50 people.  

They drove us to the Glacier where we were able to get out and walk around.  Because they have had snow as recently as last night it wasn’t really slippery as we weren‘t walking on ice.

 

The  area creates its own microclimate so the winds and temperatures are different from what one would experience all around the area. 

 

After the stop at the Glacier we had our included buffet meal at the centre…. And a goofy selfie with our driver/ guide, Colin!

 

We returned to Lake Louise via the same route on the Icefields Parkway.

 

Another wonderful day of beautiful scenes and tons of information

 

Tomorrow we are boarding the train here in Lake Louise for the first half of the trip to Vancouver.  We have enjoyed all the stops so far; can’t say we’ll be $orry to $ay good-bye to the Chateau Fairmont!  It’$ a beautiful hotel, but rather expen$ive!!!

 

That’s all for today, folks!

 

The Icefields Explorers

On the road again!

 May 9 - Lake Louise, Alberta

 

Today we moved from Banff to Lake Louise with some sightseeing stops along the way.  The driver / guides have so much information to share that it is hard to keep up.  I’ll write about some of this in no particular order.

 

Parks Canada has a lot of ongoing projects to protect the animals and the environment.  One of the interesting things they have done is build Overpasses for the wildlife to cross the highways; these overpasses cost millions of dollars to construct.  They are like traffic overpasses except that they have planted trees and other plants so that they are a continuation of the habitat on with side of the highway.

 

They have  also built hundreds of kms of wire fencing to keep the animals off the highways.  The top wire is a bit flexible and has a low voltage charge to keep the wildlife off the highways.  This has been successful in reducing highway accidents involving animals by over 90%!  In fact, due to its success, other countries have adopted this method

 

Managing the forests is another ongoing job of Parks Canada. In recent years they have used Prescribed burns to renew the forest and as a method to try and eradicate the destructive pine beetle.  It takes several days of -40° temp or extreme heat to kill them, and they have not had that in Banff National Park in recent years, so these fires are being used.

 

Radio collars are also used to track animals and monitor their behaviour.  For example, if a wolf gets too close to a town or campground they can put a collar on it and determine if it is not well.  If it doesn’t come back, they would treat it as an isolated occurrence, but if it kept returning they might try to find out why.

Again today we saw beautiful scenery where the guide made photoshops along our route.  

route.  One of those stops was Emerald Lake.

 

You can see that there is still a fair bit of snow around!

 

We travelled to  Yoho National Park which is about 15 km inside the Alberta / BC border.

We stopped at Natural bridge , a natural rock formation that spans the flow of the Kicking Horse River.  

 

And today we finally saw the elusive elk! A small herd were just grazing as we were pulling off the road!  

 

We arrived at our hotel, Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise  in the early afternoon.  When we got to our room, this was the scene from our window! Yep!  Snow!

 

We are having an early night, excited about our day at the Columbia Icefields tomorrow!

 

Stay tuned!

The Travellers!

May 8 - Sunday is a day of rest!

 May 8 - Banff, Alberta

 

Temperature when we woke up was -6°!   BRRRR!

 

We are enjoying the slow start today with nothing in particular on the agenda!  So today’s post will be a bit of a hodgepodge!

 

First of all we didn’t mention some wildlife sightings from our drive yesterday.  We saw a couple of white-tailed deer prancing off into the woods,

 

some big horn sheep posing for tourists at the edge of the woods,

 

and a mule deer ( clearly not his best side!!  LOL)

 

This message is for Barry!  We learned of a new dive location - Lake Minnewanka; apparently the temperature at the dive depth is 2° C year round, but the visibility is much better in the winter without silt being stirred up by boats and people.  A whole town was flooded when the dam was built and they are still finding remnants/ relics from that town!  Even yesterday the ice wasn’t completely melted on the lake!

 

This morning we decided to take a walk down ‘the Avenue’ (Banff Ave) and look for a cafe where we could have a quick breakfast.  Evelyn’s Coffee Shop turned out to be the perfect spot! After some sustenance, we continued walking almost to the north end of downtown Banff.  They have an interesting arrangement for crossing the Main Street here - our bus driver yesterday said it is called ‘scramble’!  The traffic signals allow vehicular traffic to go through, but then it cycles to another setting for pedestrians where pedestrians can cross in any direction on their signal - N/S, E/W and diagonally!!  Seems weird, but I guess it would really work!  Here are the ‘instructions’ …

 

You can just see the signal showing how many seconds you have left to cross (to the left of the sign and above the guy who is crossing’s head! )

 

And this is what the road looks like!

 

Strolling on The Avenue - mountains all around us!

 

Tonight is our Evening Wildlife Safari!   We had been watching the skies all day as they were forecasting rain in the afternoon and into the evening; however, the sun stayed with us with temps about 6°-8°. We had a great guide/driver who really knew the park and the animals; this enabled her to provide a lot of information in an interesting and entertaining way.  She took us to three different areas - Vermillion Lake, a wetland, a higher elevation over looking the town, and back to Lake Minnewanka.  We have still not spotted the elusive elk!  But the three predominant animals were the ones pictured above - white-tailed deer, mule deer, and bighorn sheep.  As we just got back, I haven’t had time to go through the photos, but maybe I’ll have a chance to include them later in the week.

 

It has been another enjoyable day in Banff.  On to Lake Louise tomorrow!

Keep watching for more!

 

Cheers,

The Nature Lovers!