It is along this road that you see portions of the largest intact glacier- a remnant of the Ice Age- on the North American Continent. When we arrived at the Icefields center, we decided to splurge and send Rob and the boys up onto the glacier on a snow-crawler. I stayed behind because it would have cost another $50 and with one paying adult the boys could go for free. I took a little hike by myself, which was really nice, while the boys went up to the foot of the glacier and actually got to get out and walk around on it.
They filled their water bottles up with pure glacier water too, which I thought was pretty cool. It turned out to be 100% worth it, if you are ever contemplating throwing down $50 to walk on the Athabasca Glacier. By the time Jasper and Gideon are my age, the glacier will most likely be completely melted so it was a once in a lifetime opportunity for all of them. The most shocking thing to me about this glacier were the markings scientists have made every 10 years that show how far it’s melted back. In the past 20 years, they’ve put up markings every couple of years to show the melt rate since it’s melting so quickly. It was kind of hard for me. I started to cry when I was out hiking by myself. I know we aren't living in the Ice Age anymore. It just breaks my heart to think about the beautiful things that are disappearing from our planet. Someday, when I'm rich and famous, I'd like to help preserve these beauties for generations to come.
That night, we made it to Jasper National Park and camped at Whistlers. We saw a whole bunch of elk right around our camp!
We had so many places we were anxious to go to, so we woke up early n September 9th and drove up to Maligne Lake. We spent a good portion of the morning there on a neat little hike called Moose Loop. The kids had so much fun gathering sticks and playing superheroes as we hiked.
They both did great on the three-mile loop. After Maligne Lake we drove up to Miette Hot springs. This was definitely the highlight for Jasper. He’s been talking about it since. After the hot springs, we drove to Jasper town. We ate at a place called “Jasper’s Pizza” which was yummy and fun for the family. We also spent a lot of money on T-shirts, pens, magnets, pads of paper, and toys that say “Jasper” on them… I think we outdid ourselves but I do have a nice stockpile of stocking stuffers for Jasper till he’s at least 12 ☺ All the while, I was feeling bad for little Gid. We are in Jasper National Park, eating Jasper pizza in Jasper town, and buying stuff that said Jasper on it. I think Gid was feeling a bit left out, so we made sure to find a few special things for just him too.
We started off the morning of September 10th with an awesome ride up the Jasper Sky Tram. The tram takes you up 7472 feet to really great viewpoint of Jasper and the surrounding mountains.
If you really want the best view, you have to climb to the top of the mountain, which we did. Jasper and Gid did awesome climbing up the mountain. Gid needed help, of course, so Rob helped carry him when he got tuckered out. The mountain was steep and the rock was very loose. Jasper did the whole thing by himself. We were so proud of him. At the top, the view was amazing- 360-degree view!
After the mountain, we drove to Mount Edith Cavell and the Angel Glacier. We hiked about 2 ½ miles on the most interesting loop that goes through a newly formed, young forest. The valley that we hiked through was recently a glacier that melted, so the forest has begun to reclaim the rock field that was left behind. At the far end of the loop, there was a beautiful view of the glaciers that are left and an iceberg lake. The boys loved that freezing cold icy lake and had a ball throwing rocks onto the chunks of ice.
The next morning (September 11th) it was time to head back to Banff, so we packed up camp and hit the road. We spent most of the day in the car, with stops along the way for quick hikes and viewpoints. One of the hikes we did was this neat waterfall and canyon. We arrived at the Banff Center, where Rob’s conference was to begin that evening.
September 12th was Sunday, so we went to church in Banff. We had such a neat time there at that little church building and meeting the members of the Banff Branch. Jasper and Gideon both loved the primary and nursery. We did laundry and rested the rest of the day, which was really nice.
The Banff Center was really nice and such a welcome change to have a nice, comfortable bed for a few nights. While Rob was at his conference all week, the boys and I took little hikes, explored Banff town, and checked out every single public park in Banff. The weather was really nice until the end of the week when it started to get cold. We’d steal Rob away when he had little breaks in the conference to go do a little hike as a family.
On the 14th, Rob had the afternoon off, so we took a hike up this really neat river to a series of waterfalls. You hike along the river on this very narrow pathway and some of it is an actual catwalk! It was incredible.
We ended the day with ice cream cones in Banff at Canada’s famous Moo ice cream shop.
Rob did really well speaking at his conference. He made some good connections and met some other super smart people doing similar research. It was so terrific that he was able to speak at this conference, and that we were able to tag along and make it into a family adventure too.
After the conference, instead of heading straight back toward the States, we drove east a bit more to Drumheller, home to the world’s largest dinosaur museum. This museum was amazing! The boys loved it! We have a gazillion dino pictures to share, so I might need to make an entire post with just them. The trip was so much fun and a very-much needed family bonding experience. I'm so glad it all worked out and we made it back from our adventure safe.
2 comments:
These are incredible pictures. I have never seen anything like this. The icebergs are really magnificent and I bet even more amazing in person. Thanks for sharing!
What an amazing adventure you guys had. Love the photos.
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