May Long Weekend - Solo - 2008!
Trip Start
Aug 1995
1
10
12
Trip End
May 19, 2008
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Jasper National Park, Alberta, Canada
Monday, May 19, 2008
I wanted to go away this May Long Weekend SO badly, especially after having worked my butt off this year since Africa and getting a new full time job and all, so when plans fell thru for having someone else to go on this trip with I said SO WHAT I'm going anyways!! hehe and I'm so glad I did! I chose Banff and Jasper cuz they're places I have never gone except passing through, yet they're within reach of a long weekend's drive. People thought I was crazy as usual but I have had SUCH a good time I think I made a great decision coming here!!
Yesterday I drove from 7am to 7pm stopping here and there but mostly in Revelstoke because of the huge landslide that happened near Golden (of which I have pictures and video of the aftermath) that I would have been caught in had I left the 3 hours earlier that I had originally planned to
Muddslide between Revelstoke and Golden
! yay but I only had to wait an hour in traffic and then it was smooth sailin. Oh, by the way, I rented a car. Poor Susan is getting too elderly to make such long treks as she used to (Oregon, etc.). I have a fanshy shmanshy new Hyundai Accent instead hehe! So I stopped in Lake Louise and it was very pretty there!!! Touristy of course, but it was gorgeous. And the best part was finally being in the Rockies and seeing glaciers!! The even better best part was sitting on a rock taking pictures at the edge of the partially frozen lake and then hearing something that sounded distinctly like thunder, but it was mostly sunny. So I looked to the people next to me who also looked puzzled and asked them, "did you hear that too?" and they said yeah! Then we both looked and there was an avalanche - slash - glacier calving ice falling off the edge of the glacier on the other side of the lake! Soooo cooooooooooooooooool... this trip has been a MAJOR boost to my Geography Nerd Tendencies lol.... the sound of it was amazing, especially considering it was a pretty small one! I cant imagine the sound of a large avalanche!
Anyhow, I continued on to Banff and upon arrival was slightly disappointed. I remember driving through the Rockies on the way to Alberta with my Mom and Dave and my brother, and I remember it having way more glaciers and stuff and I remember Banff completely differently
Muddslide between Revelstoke and Golden
. It was 13 years ago, however, so maybe the town has been built up more since then, but how it is now is very touristy, plus the fact that it was May long weekend. I checked in to my hostel and tried to make my food-poisoned-due-to-egg-sandwich Aussie roomate feel better with some pepto tablets, then went to town for dinner. My dinner ended up being a split decision between the Spaghetti Factory (everywhere else was too fancy for a lone girlie like me to go eat in) or going to a movie, or both, but when I realized my watch was still an hour behind (its an hour ahead here little did I remember) and the movie started in 20 mins, I went to the movie and had popcorn for dinner. What Happens in Vegas was good lol. Although I must say Cameron Diaz looks either really old or too tanned or plastic surgery overboard but something wasn't right lol! Evidently, I didnt feel too great about staying in Banff another day. So instead of taking my planned hike in Banff, I checked out of the hostel and booked a room in Jasper. THAT WAS THE BEST DECISION EVERRRR! Instantly I loved my choice! I drove through the Columbia Icefields and stopped like every 5 minutes to take pictures! I kept bumping into the same Japanese family at various stops, and we traded taking each other's photos. It was perfect! I got some fantastic photos and had a great time stopping on the side of the road and gawking at the glaciers with random music blaring in the background
Welcome to Alberta!!
. You wouldn't think "Ghetto Superstar" would be a good backup tune but it was! I also was aware of the teetering landslides and avalanches all around me (evidence provided by the multitude of giant debris flows and rockfalls I kept driving past which were very obviously only one or two days old!! when would the next one be?!) and worried slightly about my loud and bumpin' bass from my car and its vibrations causing the final straw that made snow and rock to tumble down and bury me hahaha... But the best part of the day and possibly one of the best parts of my LIFE was when I drove up to the Athabasca glacier area and realized OH MY GOD ITS FREAKIN GORGEOUS... not only that, but OH MY GOD I CAN FREAKIN GET OUT OF MY CAR AND CLIMB UP TO IT!!!?!?!??!?! I am not crazy I swear and I am embarrassed to say it but I literally had fringes of tears in my eyes at the sheer beauty of it as I pulled off the road into the parking lot! And then when I realized there was a route up to the glacier and it wasnt even ugly or touristy or anything (mostly) then I got this huge adrenaline rush and excitement and changed shoes and put on 60 sunscreen (the sun is SO BRIGHT on the snow!!!) and left the car and literally speedwalked through the rubble to the glacier! I only had one moment of brief disruption when I fell into a river trying to cross it and got wet up to my knees but I was smiling so huge
Field, BC
! I didnt care! and the other two people who barely escaped the water ahead of me and I realized a minute later that we could have avoided this whole mess by just taking the paved road below... but this was much more fun! It was at the top of this HUGE glacial outwash below a GIGANTIC lateral moraine (stuff that melts out of a glacier when it recedes) and the view from where I fell into the river was INTENSE and gorgeous and rugged and full of black and orange layered rocks, with a turquoise half-frozen glacial lake below. With the extremely strong glacial wind blowing cold air in my face cooling me from the hot sun and the snowy peaks above me with light blue glaciers crumbling off of them I felt like I was in my own personal heaven seriously and as cheesy as that sounds... being up there gave me the hugest peaceful feeling I have ever had!! And I wasnt even at the glacier yet! I kept walking and walking then climbed the snowy ascent to the snout of the glacier taking picture after picture... then I was finally at the point where the glacier meets the rubble and is spewing meltwater like a freakin giant's fire hose and I was beaming!!! And squinting! cuz it was so bright! But i loved it soooo much.... it was HUGE like a big white tongue right in front of me, with the sun shining directly above and clouds wisping across the pointy peaks around the glacier... not more than one or two other people around... the only thing that sucked was not being able to actually TOUCH the glacier because they put up a rope between the outwash area and the glacier
View from the riverbanks, Field, BC
. The water rushing between the glacier and me was just a meter too wide for me to reach my arm out and touch... and the only way I could actually touch it was to spend a load of money on a tour bus that drives up onto the glacier itself and you can walk on it.... but I liked my way better hehe I couldnt even see the tourists or the buses from where I was and this was my own experience, not the experience of me and a busload of others (like Egypt was at the pyramids except that was 80 busloads and 7000 others!!). I sat on a rock and just sat there and sat there, built an inukshuk, kept the rock that i put on the top of the inukshuk hehehe, and just sat there! it was the best feeling ever. I dunno what it is with me and glaciers! I studied them in university sooo much and have always had a thing with mountains... even when I was really young I was obsessed with them on road trips. While other kids would just sleep in the car and ask "are we there yet", I always stare out the window and dont want to get to the destination! I cried when we had to get off the Royal Hudson train when I was 9 cuz i didn't want it to be over yet hahaha... anyways. It was a greeeeat day and I'm so glad I didn't stay in Banff! I headed down from the glacier and decided not to take the paved road all the way again cuz that was too boring so I walked until I thought I had reached the culvert that let the river I fell into go underneath the road, then I headed back up the rubbly hills and back over to where I remembered I parked the car
Lake Louise, Alberta
. Its like a huge valley with rolling cobbles and boulders all the way up to the parking lot which you cant even see. I stopped and took more photos of rocks and flowers etc cuz i couldnt help it, then over another little peak I was like FARRRDGAJFJAKFSJK:F:JJK:F it was that damn river I fell in again!! I guess the one I had crossed was a different one!! So I located the spot that I crossed at before and noticed the river was even bigger than it was last time (the sun got hotter and the increase in running water washed out one of the dikes and started running over the main road), plus from this point of view on the other side I realized that the snow I had crossed to get to this crossing was really only about a foot and a half deep and the river flowed right below it!! No worries mom and dad it wasnt like the columbia river or anything, if the snow caved in I wouldnt get swept into oblivion, I would just be like 20 feet downstream and soaked and my camera would be destroyed, not my life lol! But I sooooo didnt wanna walk all the way down to that stupid road and then all the way back up again, so I stood there contemplating for a couple minutes then practiced my jumping stance. I balanced on a boulder and even threw a boulder onto the edge of the snow I was jumping onto to see if it had weakened, then I finally said 'here goes' and went for it!! I... ALMOST... made it!! hahaha I got one foot on the hard packed snow, adn one foot went right on through and into the water and got all super muddy and stuff, but again I just laughed and kept going lol...
Lake Louise, Alberta
. but I warned the oncoming couple that they might not want to go that way, and they took one look at my soaking wet leg and went the other way hahaha! So now I'm here in Jasper, trying to kill time until I have to go to bed because my hostel is super crummy lol... I have to sleep in a bunk room with about 45 other girls lol it feels like an army camp or something! My bunk is right in the middle of this gigantic room with about 20 bunk beds in it... its really, really weird. Of all the hostels I've stayed in around the world, especially the ones that cost freakin $30 bucks, this is the weirdest by far! But I'm leaving super early tomorrow morning so I dont care lol... I'm getting up at 4am (if I actually wake up ughhh I hope so). The car has to be returned at 445pm and I'm giving myself plenty of extra time for long weekend traffic.
OH and I saw a black bear on the way home and have a super cute video of him bumbling around eating grass hehe!
So thats all for now, it was a HUGE one sorry but I had fun so I wanna write about it! And I know if I waited til I got home to write it I wouldn't do it so here we are.
Thanks for reading and hope everyone had a great relaxing sunny fun weekend!!!!!
Love,
Michelle!
