Sunday, June 5, 2016

Canadian Rockies Day 2 Hike until you can hardly move!

Day 2 of our trip was all about hiking.  We did two rather long hikes and racked up over 40000 steps and 400 flights of stairs by the end of the day.  It was a good day, but very exhausting by the end.

The day started with this view for breakfast in our room

After a quick breakfast and daytrip packing we took transcanada hwy 1 to Lake Morraine to begin our hike.  They have these cool wildlife crossing bridges and high fencing around the entire hwy to help protect all the wildlife

About 40 min later we arrived in Lake Louise which is also the turn to Lake Morraine

Quick stop at the trailbreak cafe for some mochas and then we were off for the final 15 km to our hike

I stopped in the outhouse once we got there and promptly broke my phone.  It was actually better then it could have because another few inches and it would have been in the outhouse not just on the floor with a broken screen. 

Lake Morraine at the start of our hike.  Notice how clear it is!

First part of the hike looked like this.  Lots of uphill through a forest.  Hard, but not so bad

We got to the top and there was snow including this creation by somebody before us.

Next up was a walk through larch valley with views like this.

Lots of great wildflowers along the way.  Most of the flowers look like things from our hike last weekend on the northshore 


A nice family took our picture with the mountain backdrop

He was not happy to have so many people going so close to his home

Waterfall as we neared the top of larch valley toward sentinal pass

More cool flowers

This is a larch tree after which this part of the walk was named.  It is a pinetree, but it only grows at high elevations.  It also drops its needles in the fall.  When we were there the needles were just starting to come out for the year.

More snow the higher we went

And that is the middle is sentinal pass which was our final destination for this hike

Getting there meant walking through quite a bit of snow

Lots of avalanches could be heard on our entire hike.  (Don't worry the part we were doing was not below any peaks with snow still)

This spider was living on the snow and we passed him on the way up.

Dinky and we all made it to the top!

Great views everywhere

So excited to be at the top!  We had some water, and kind bar and an apple before heading back the way we came.  The way back was even scarier because the snow was getting soft and slippery.

Lake Morraine on the way back.  There weren't any great open views of the lake, but you could see its beautiful colors for about 1/3 of the hike.

And back at the bottom nearly 9 miles after we left.

We got in the car and drove back to the trailbreak cafe for lunch which was some much needed soup and sandwhiches.

Saw this cool looking bird walking to get our water bottles filled.

Couldn't leave without a peanut butter brownie!

Next stop was Johnston Canyon off the Bow Valley Parkway

Map of our hike

We walked through to the upper falls as quickly as possible hoping that the crowds would be much thinner when we returned.  The hike was still cool though!  You walk on catwalks for part of it that are actually suspended over the canyon.

One of the waterfalls along the way.

High falls.  This is the last stop for lots of people, but we still had life in our legs so we continued on.

Inkpots here we come!

This is an inkpot.  You can see the sand bobbling up on the bottom.  It is actually quicksand and some water flows in for underneath.

Better view of the sand formations that happen.

Inkpots with the mountains in the background

Zach couldn't resist cooling his feet off.

One last look before heading back

Waterfalls were much more pleasant to view with about 1/5 of the crowd from earlier in the day.

High falls (there was a rainbow, but it didn't show up well)


Gives you an idea of what some or the trail was like

Stunning low falls!

Turns out though that once we climbed up closer there was just too much mist to get a picture.

:-)

We got back the the car and had enough time left to drive the Bow Valley Parkway back to Banff, shower and then head out for dinner

Block Kitchen and Bar was our dinner stop in downtown Banff

Beet Quinoa salad was really good!

Duck Poutine was not the best dish

The Bison flatbread was quite good.  After this though our server just disappeared.  We were going to order dessert, but after about 30 min to get our check from when the last dishes (and water!) were taken away that was not happening.

Instead we got ice cream cones at this place obsessed with cows that seemed to be the Ben and Jerry's of Canada

And the bedtime/hot tub view.  We hardly could keep our eyes open to figure out the next day.

More great adventures planned for tomorrow!


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