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June 23 - June 28, 2006
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Banff and Jasper National Parks,
Alberta, Canada
It's quite an amazing change to fly from
Miami, Florida, to Calgary on a mid-June day. Palms are
replaced by conifers, humidity is nearly banished, and
insanity replaced with potential. I spent the first night in
Calgary and awoke the next morning to see the sun breaking
through the clouds, and the pleasant smell of spruce and fir
trees really boosted my spirits. This was going to be an
amazing experience and tremendous fun. I spent the next five
days driving, hiking, camping, and exploring as much of the
Canadian Rockies as I could.
Temperatures ranged from 0-33° C (32-91°
F), with mostly clear conditions except for portions of the
beginning and end of the trip. Gas was CAN $1.05-1.09 per
liter (USD $3.57-3.71 per gallon). I was thrilled by the
gorgeous views and abundant wildlife that I found, surprised
by the commercialization within the park, and pleased that the
many Canadians I met were so friendly.
I certainly hope that I can return to
this area of the world again and stay for a much longer period
of time. There are several other parks adjacent to Banff and
Jasper (including Kootenay and Yoho) that I was unable to see
in much detail. I hope that you enjoy these two pages of photographs!
To anyone with a 56K or slower internet connection, I
apologize for the slow loading time.
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1. Two young Pileated Woodpecker
chicks asking for food in their aspen tree...
there was one little one farther
inside the nest cavity.
2. daddy Pileated Woodpecker
3. In time this destruction will yield
tomorrows beautiful forests, while providing essential habitat for
many insects, birds, and other critters
4. Canadian Pacific headed east
5. Moraine Lake during its midday
glory. The water is full of a very fine glacial "flour" from the
rock-grinding action of nearby ice. This sediment is the right size
to reflect the turquoise that so awes visitors to the northern
Rockies.
6. Golden-mantled Ground Squirrel
7. The day ends in Jasper National
Park
8. A quick storm results in a partial
rainbow over a snow-capped peak along the Continental Divide
9. With darkness there must come
light...
10. The tundra's snowpack is melting
and life is poised to take advantage of the short growing season.
Slowly slipping down the mountainside is the extremely large
Saskatchewan Glacier
11. Columbian Ground Squirrel up above
the tree line
12. Another view of the alpine tundra
13. Dusky Grouse
14. Dusky Grouse chick
15. Black Bear
16. Black Bear close-up; happily eating
dandelions
17. female Elk
18. Spotted Sandpiper near its
riverside nest
19. Evening is near
20.
21. Moose calf
22. American Robin
23. A glacier with its meltwater lake
in the foreground
24. An avalanche; You hear a snap first
and then things are eerily silent. Then finally you hear a growing
rumble and you look to see if the entire mountainside is going to
come down on you! In this case most of the ice stayed put, but I'm
sure this stream of falling ice and snow is much larger than it
appears.
25. Angel Glacier hangs above a glacial
melt lake in the Edith Cavell region of Jasper National Park - there
is no
way to communicate the immense size
of that sheet of ice; nor is there any way to communicate the
spine-tingling sounds that would
occasionally echo down the mountainside. The morning sun was warming
the perched glacier and all around
me were previous chunks of ice (as big as cars) that had fallen
in the not so distant past.
26. Right before sunset in Jasper National Park
27. mother Mountain Goat and her kid
28. The very tip of a mountain in the
Columbia Icefield
29. A marked path on Athabasca Glacier
- with a nearby sign warning that their last several rescue attempts
had been unsuccessful - I saw people straying from the path, but I
did not feel like falling down a glacial fissure
30. Looking down into the ice near the
toe of the glacier you
could see lots of suspended sediments and rocks.
31. Just one of many signs marking the
retreat of Athabasca Glacier. It was amazing to see how far the
glacier had retreated...several dozen million cubic meters of ice
have melted in the last hundred years.
32. Looking back on the road just
traveled.
33. The tourist hotspot overlook at
Peyto Lake. Better views and total solitude can be had not far away
34. Peyto Lake
35. One of the luckiest Hoary Marmots I
know. He was sitting on a rock staring out over the magnificent view
of Peyto Lake (seen above). Can you imagine waking up to such a view
everyday?
36. Sediments and more glacial flour
pouring into Peyto Lake
37. Hoary Marmot
38. juvenile Clark's Nutcracker
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