Day 6 - Wednesday 9/20/2017 - Drive Icefield Parkway North
Woke up and finished packing. The view up at Lake Louise from the hotel was beautiful! The yellow patches were really coming out on the mountains above Lake Louise! We checked out and went to The Trailhead for breakfast again and even grabbed a few Beef Sausage rolls for the road.
We drove up Bow Valley Parkway for a little ways toward Banff to get to Morants Curve at about 9:00 AM. It is a famous spot that offers a good view of the Lake Louise mountains with the tracks of the Canadian Pacific Railroad in the foreground. The spot was used throughout the history of the Canadian Pacific Railway for promotional pictures. The spot was actually fairly crowded with people there taking in the fall sights of the mountains. We hung there about 10 minutes (me praying for a train to show up) and then proceeded back to Lake Louise and started north on the Icefield Parkway.
We drove up Bow Valley Parkway for a little ways toward Banff to get to Morants Curve at about 9:00 AM. It is a famous spot that offers a good view of the Lake Louise mountains with the tracks of the Canadian Pacific Railroad in the foreground. The spot was used throughout the history of the Canadian Pacific Railway for promotional pictures. The spot was actually fairly crowded with people there taking in the fall sights of the mountains. We hung there about 10 minutes (me praying for a train to show up) and then proceeded back to Lake Louise and started north on the Icefield Parkway.
The clouds quickly lowered on us and by Bow Lake, the snow was falling and already sticking. We stopped at the Bow Summit / Peyto Lake View Point and parked in the bus lot. It was beautiful, but snowing real hard. The walk way to get to the view point was slick!
We continued on north on the Icefield Parkway and the snow lightened but continued to fall past Bow Summit. We did a few more pull outs and the light, relatively non-sticking snow stayed with us to the Columbia Icefield Discovery Center where we stopped to grab a few drinks and go to the bathroom. We continued north from there and the snow got harder and started sticking on the road. The Sportage’s four-wheel drive helped out and the car was really stable on the snow. We were greeted in Jasper by big, wet snowflakes and snow covered sidewalks.
We continued on north on the Icefield Parkway and the snow lightened but continued to fall past Bow Summit. We did a few more pull outs and the light, relatively non-sticking snow stayed with us to the Columbia Icefield Discovery Center where we stopped to grab a few drinks and go to the bathroom. We continued north from there and the snow got harder and started sticking on the road. The Sportage’s four-wheel drive helped out and the car was really stable on the snow. We were greeted in Jasper by big, wet snowflakes and snow covered sidewalks.
I checked out the Canadian National train yard there and the group did a little shopping. We hit the Jasper National Park visitor center and they filled us in on trails that could be done with snow on the ground as our plans of doing the skytram and / or big hikes the next day were looking shaky. With concerns on the road conditions, we headed east to Hinton and our room for the night at Holiday Inn. Hinton was about an hour east of Jasper, just outside of the National Park and lodging was a good bit cheaper. The roads cleared 20 minutes outside of Jasper and it was just light snow in Hinton with nothing really sticking. We made it to the Holiday Inn about 4:00pm. Hinton was the model for a blue collar town and eating places were looking shady, but we ended up at Gus’s Pizza and it was very good. The portions were huge!
Safe Travels,
B&E
Safe Travels,
B&E