makeshiftmind

Yesterday was a long day.  We set out early in the morning, slowly making our way north to Jasper National Park, with stopovers in Kootenay and Yoho, and some scenic driving via the glacier fields along the Icelands Parkway.  We decided to bypass construction on highway 1 heading north, and veered off to the parallel two-lane highway 1A, which has a much slower speed limit, many more treacherous curves, and a far better view of the mountainside.  At one point we noticed a small car pulled off to the side of the road, so we slowed to see if there was any wildlife present, and we were rewarded with the sight of two black wolves weaving their way through the trees beside the road.  Unfortunately, by the time we brandished the camera, they were obscured by the thick undergrowth and we were unable to photograph them.

Our journey into Kootenay began with a series of forests, all burnt to the ground in prescribed forest fires that the park maintainers use to eliminate hordes of insects that destroy forests by eating trees from the inside out.  By burning large sections of trees, the remaining forest is saved from insect infestation, and new migration paths are opened to indigenous wildlife.

The Paint Pots were our first destination.  Mined in the late 1800s for the colored clay they produce, the paint pots are iron-rich natural springs that bubble up through the earth.  The minerals in the water seep into the surrounding land and create large ochre fields which are mostly barren, soggy, and a deep orange hue.  The hike to the paint pots was short and mild, but worth the trip to see such an odd phenomenon.  We also saw several small rock piles near a riverbed that we had to cross, which we later learned were special markers called Inukshuk and were originally created by the Inuit people as a navigation guide or marker for a food cache.  Hikers often use them for the same purposes.

After we left Kootenay, we pushed our little Mazda up and up and up, all the way across the Continental Divide, then down and down and down into Yoho National Park.  The warning signs along the road came in many varieties: “Winter Tires or Chains Required Beyond This Point”, “Warning: Avalanche Country”, and “Break Inspections Ahead” were some of my favorites.  Traffic was very light, and at one particularly sharp bend, we saw a coyote making his way across the highway.  The drive through Yoho was incredible — the highway ran through a large valley, surrounded on all sides by enormous mountains.  We wound our way up to the Bow and Kicking Horse River junction, where the two mighty rivers converged in a torrent of blue frothing mountain water, gushing over boulders below us.  Across the canyon were the Spiral Tunnels — caves cut into the mountain side to allow trains to traverse the range without steep vertical ascents.  In the mountains, trains are still a significant means of transporting goods because large semi-trucks don’t make the treacherous trip very well.

Our next destination was in Jasper National Park, located past the northern tip of Banff.  The drive to Jasper took us two and a half hours, one way, and the clock had already struck noon so we sped off into the great North as fast as we could (which apparently wasn’t very fast because cars were hauling ass around us in excess of 120 kph).  The drive to Jasper from Banff is rated by National Geographic as one of the world’s most stunning drives in the world.  The mountain range seemed to grow and expand the further north that we went.  We passed by several icy lakes fed by melting mountain glaciers.  We pulled off the road at Hector Lake and stood by the car, mesmerized by the ocean of glass before us.  Further down the highway, we passed by Crowfoot and Bow Glaciers, mammoth beds of ice high atop the mountain range.  The glaciers looked as if they would slip from their lofty positions high above us and slide off the mountains with maddening fury and crush everything below, but in reality they had been receding for some time and we were in no real mortal danger.

Once we arrived in Jasper, we located the trail head for our excursion: the icefields at Wilcox Pass.  We noticed that as we traveled north towards Jasper, the weather had gotten several degrees colder, and the snow that had been previously melting was now accumulating.  But we weren’t about to let that deter us, so we bundled up, threw on our CamelBaks, and started plodding through the snow up a very large mountain.  The trail was rated “moderate” by the trail guide, but the packed snow, near invisible trail, and steep incline proved more challenging than we had anticipated.  We watched our footing carefully, and after some time, we finally breached the treeline high above the trail head.  The view was unbelievable — easily my favorite part of our hiking experience in Canada.  We moved along the side of the mountain with a dizzying drop to our left, and a barren field of pines and brush to our right.  Far below was a valley through which the Icelands Parkway moved traffic further north.  Beyond that was the dazzling Columbia Icefield, a collection of the park’s most impressive glaciers.  From our vantage point we were treated to an earth-shattering view of the Athabasca Glacier, a tsunami of ice cresting the mountain peeks and pouring down into the valley below.  Pictures and words can never do it justice.  I have never seen anything as majestic as Athabasca in all its frozen glory.

It was nearing dusk as we returned to our car, but the drive back to our lodge offered us a view of the now familiar mountain ranges at sunset.  The setting sun cast rays across the frozen peaks, and poked through the treeline as made our way back to Canmore.  We arrived home late, and after a healthy dinner of McDonald’s (we were hungry!), we crashed into bed and slept soundly.

You can see our pictures in the Banffventure 2009 Day 6 web album!