Lobstick Lodge Hotel Jasper

... and let me take his photo. Of course, I only got one chance before he scampered off. <br><br> Then I got even luckier and saw a Moose - well two actually, a cow and a bull.<br><br>On the way back into town we saw big horned sheep and more elk and then when I got back to the hotel, there was an Elk buck and his harem of does sitting in the grounds of the hotel. It was amazing. <br><br> This morning I went on a ...

... Where had she come from? &#8220;I just ran the Notch.&#8221; The Notch is the highest point of the hike and 22 km from the start. So her day's exercise was a mere 44 km run, involving a vertical gain of about 1000 meters, along uneven rocky trails. <br><br>Starting at the car park for our lift to the far end of the hike, we met a good dozen others doing the same thing. Most of them had tiny day packs. They could afford this seemingly masterful piece of light packing because ...

... bus is the sleeping quarters for the people on tour. I researched this phenomena on-line and learned that it is predominantly for European tourists. They offer tours of America, Canada, Africa and South America. They're not cheap either. I can't imagine sleeping in a small bunk and sharing living quarters with 21 strangers for a month or so.<br><br>Our second day in Jasper we went to see Maligne Caynon and ...

... and more mountains, we then journeyed onwards to the Big Beehive (a mountain) we could've done the little beehive, but bigger is better. Sadly we got to the other side of the lake, (about ¼ of the hike) however could not continue on as the previous walkers tracks stopped and the path disappeared beneath the snow.... which we had already been traversing for the last 500 metres or so. We decided we could not go on so ...

... raven with very bushy brows! We decided to pop back up to the tramway to see if we could go up again as it had cleared, but the girl at the desk gave a vehement (but uneducated!!) no. My subsequent complaint letter to the company yielded an apology and two complementary tickets. It turns out that we should have been allowed back up because of the bad weather-so note that to any who may visit there!! <br><br>After some dinns we then headed out for a hike as the skies ...

... prairies. Absolutely stunning nevertheless. "Is that it?" I said to David??! 1 day was a fantastic taster though and a provocation to return and see The Rockies properly. (David: I did wave a map vaguely in front of Lois' face, but I think something fluffy went by at the time...) (Lois: cheeky *******!......at least I SAW an Elk!) One night, we stopped in Winnipeg. The train stopped for 3 hours for refuelling and disembarkments. So, we were free to wander around briefly before ...

... this is $20 per day. So we fronted up with $100 for 5 days - a bit more than what we bargained for. We headed straight for the only campsite that is still open in Jasper, the other 9 are closed for the season. Thus, we expected it to be quite busy, and hoping we could get in, as we hadn't booked, but we'd nothing to worry about, plenty of room, and even still some spaces with electric hook-up (remember this is a National Park, and as such you ...

... the past. As we headed up the moraine there were numerous signs indicating the former position of the ice and notice boards attributing this to global warming, as a geographer I agree that the melt back is occurring, it was clearly visible, but I'm still not convinced of mans influence. We headed right up to the glacier, past the warning signs and fence, basically go further at your own risk. I had to stand on it, truly awesome. the white river of ice ...

... paw prints on the trail that confused us (huge bear/wolf/dog?), we didn't see anything. It had a different type of forest there, which made a nice change. Squirrels were continuing to amuse us. We saw lots of them up the pine trees biting off the cones, which then fell to the ground, presumably to dry out enough for the squirrel to get the nuts. Lots of little twigs and small branches came down in the process. Being in litigious Canada, we decided that parks staff ...

... on the bed in the river so very scenic. After checking in we went out for dinner in Jasper itself, about 5km away. The town was nice enough but nothing special really - the scenery surrounding it is what is impressive. Being almost the longest day in the northern hemisphere, it didn't get dark until after 11pm, so then went for an evening drive to Pyramid Lake. We'd read it was a good spot to see moose. Although we didn't see any, we went on a lovely short walk over a bridge ...