Work, Save, Travel, Repeat...

Saturday. We left Kelowna after breakfast for the 350 km drive back to Vancouver . We had a couple of stops along the way one of which was in an industrial area so we could find a Jasmer challenge cache! This proved easier than finding petrol as like at home many fuel stations have closed down, one had become a community garden. We managed to find a 3 hour parking meter close to Coal Harbour, just enough time for a stroll around Stanley Park where we saw a black squirrel and a raccoon. This place is full of surprises! We headed back to the harbour to our favourite bar Cardero's for one last Fat Tug IPA, succulent cod and a silky creme brulee. We have thoroughly enjoyed our two weeks in western Canada so vast and varied in the two provinces we visited. Fun facts about Canada Canada is the second biggest country in the world. Canada has the longest coastline of any country. Canada has six time zones. The transcends highway is the longest in the world. ...

Friday The weather app today said we were in Peachland and indeed this area is known for fruit growing particularly peaches, plums, apples and vineyards. We headed across the bridge over the lake into Kelowna town and then an 8 km gravel rd to Myra Canyon Provincial Park. The history here is of a railway track laid at 3000 ft above the lake looping around and clinging to the hillside by way of tunnels hewn from the rock and 18 wooden or steel trestles. The railway was decommissioned in the 1950's but the track bed has been made into a brilliant 12 km trail which can be cycled or walked. We gave the bikes a miss and walked to from trestle 18 to trestle 5, this was approximately halfway and a 12 km round trip. The area was ravaged by a wildfire in 2003 and most of the trestles were destroyed but rebuilt to the original plans by volunteers. One can only marvel at the original engineers and the dedication of those that restored the structures. The wildfire destro...

Thursday. It was a very dull daybreak today but with a big zoom lens we could just make out the Hoodoos and our lunch stop yesterday, however that wasn't to last and by the time we left the mist had obscured them. Our first stop was at Moraine Lake, a beautiful spot that we had planned to visit on our drive from Jasper but  there was no room on the car park so it was closed. It was still very busy this morning despite zero degree temperatures and snow! We still had over 400 km to Kelowna so decided not to linger too long and have a few stops along the way. This was our coffee stop. We gained an hour in time when we crossed back into British Columbia and stopped in The Glacier National Park for our picnic. There was a very interesting walk around The Loop Brook Trail. This gave us chance to stretch our legs around an abandoned railway line. A last stop was at Three Valley Lake which had a perfect mirror image. Kelowna is Canada's wine country...

Wednesday We were eager to see the area around the town of Banff so decided to leave the car in the parking lot and walk an 11 km trail to Bow Falls (which we can see from our bedroom window) to the Hoodoos. There was also a great view of our hotel from the the side of the river. It was a great trail with changes of elevation from the valley floor to a ridge high in the hills giving a great view of our hotel back in the town. The Hoodoos are spires of rock that were deposited by the glacier that carved the valley millions of years ago. On our return journey we saw a skunk, it was like a giant hairy caterpillar walking through the undergrowth. We then took a detour to Tunnel Mountain - there is no tunnel there but when the route was being surveyed for the Canada Pacific Railway a tunnel was planned until they found a better and undoubtedly cheaper route. The Fens Loop is marshy almost wetland trail the other side of town, we had a little look at the...

Tuesday Today we left our 1950's style lodge which was a cross between Center Parcs and a Dirty Dancing style holiday park. We took the iconic Icefield Parkway (Highway 93) a 300 km drive through the Jasper and Banff National Parks. This was no hardship as it is the most spectacular road straight through the Athabasca Valley with impressive peaks on either side of the road. Our first stop was at the Athabasca Falls, an impressive waterfall with warning signs "that death is swift so choose your photo stop with care!" Further up the valley we stopped at The Sunwapta falls and took a delightful walk to the lower falls which were much quieter. It was easy to see great chunks of rock that had fallen off the cliffs into the valley below to be pummelled by the force of the water. We stopped for our picnic in the Columbia Icefield at the Abathasca Glacier. The surprising thing about the toe of a glacier is how dirty it is! It has ground it's way down the...

Jasper National Park is the largest park in the Canadian Rockies, we can only explore a tiny proportion during our two day stay. We concentrated on the Maligne Valley today, the first drive-by stop was at the Maligne Overlook a valley that was formed by two glaciers meeting during the ice age. Just a little further down the valley was the Maligne Canyon. We took a woodland trail down to the sixth bridge crossing the river the widest part of the valley and then climbed through the deep gorge back to the top. The geology was fascinating - underground rivers, springs, caves, potholes and waterfalls. Further down the valley is Medicine Lake which in low flow times (autumn and winter) actually becomes a river bed, the water leaks out through a series of caves called Karsts and it only becomes a lake in times of high water flow when the snow melts in summer. Our last stop of the day was at Maligne Lake which is glacier fed, we could actually make out a glacier ...

Sunday When we planned this holiday we knew there would be a lot of driving but the scale of Canada is so difficult to comprehend, today's drive was circa 560 km i.e. Birmingham to Glasgow plus 50 miles and we have passed through no more than half a dozen small towns. The first chance we had to stretch our legs was at Rearguard Falls, not the highest falls we have visited but probably the closest we have ever been to the water flowing over the edge. To see the power of the falls from a seemingly tranquil pool of blue glacial water was awesome. The migrating Salmon have to work hard to fight against the current. As we neared the British Columbia / Alberta border the imposing sight of Mount Robson loomed ahead of us. This is the highest peak in the Rockies. We crossed a time zone as we entered Alberta from PST to Mountain Time - GMT -7. Our hotel The Jasper Fairmont Lodge is spectacular, a series of lodges bordering a lake so we managed an after dinner stroll t...