These Hills Aren't Like the Kinkora Hills

Hello British Columbia

Tanya and Natalie at the Hot Springs

Wow, what a day of driving and sight seeing.  The vastness of the Rockies can't be experienced by looking at books or seeing it on a computer it has to be done in person to witness the grandeur of them.  We've spent a couple of days seeing it first hand and it is amazing.   It is also fascinating how they were able to build roads in some of these places, especially when you think that they were originally done almost 80 years ago.  I can tell you that driving on some of them left me with some sweaty hands on the steering wheel.  There was a particular section today around Golden, BC where I wouldn't want to have to drive every day.

The Carons at Lake Louise

We started our morning by visiting the Banff Hot Springs.  We were one of the first groups to arrive as I had read that it was good to visit it either early in the morning or late at night because it gets busy during the day.  It was another glorious day and it was 20 degrees outside when we got going.   That was nothing compared to the 39 C it stated the water was in the pool.  We soaked in the heated water with the mountains as a backdrop and watched the gondolas travel up and down Sulphur Mountain.  Tanya was reminiscing about the time she traveled on it when she visited her friend Kathy in Banff back in the late 1990's.  It was recommended to only stay in the springs for a maximum of 20 minutes, which we did, but it was too long for Andrea who felt a bit dizzy when we got out.  After a few drinks of cold water and a cool shower she was feeling fine again.

The kids dip their feet in - brr it was cold

We headed north on the Trans Canada to Lake Louise where it took us some time to find a parking space.  It was amazing how many cars were parked in the public parking lots and the distances that they traveled from.  Tanya prepared a sheet with license plates from all the Provinces, Territories and States before we left home and we are now down to 16 left to see.  Two Canadian ones - Newfoundland and Labrador and Nunavut and 14 States.  The kids enjoy looking at all the different license plates trying to spot the remaining ones on our list.

The kids posed a lot at Lake Louise

Lake Louise was absolutely stunning.  The clear blue water which is a result of the water coming from melting glaciers was a truly an amazing site.  You could tell that there were people from all over the world here because of all the different languages being spoken.  We took a short hike to one end of the lake where a gentleman from California offered to take a family picture for us and he told us that he had been there 40 years earlier with his parents.  He said the hotel wasn't as big but the area was just as busy.


We had lunch in the parking lot and had to keep telling the kids to sit by the front of the car because the cars were just piling in the parking lot and if they saw you by the car they would wait for you to leave.  We had to tell many people that we weren't leaving for a while.

Playing at the Parks is always fun

After lunch we headed through Yoho National Park and Glacier National Park making our way to BC.  As I mentioned earlier the roads were very interesting with very few level straightaways.  Through all the parks there are lookouts along the route and one of the most interesting ones we saw was called tunnel mountain.  In my opinion it was an engineering marvel.  What was happening was the slope for the original train track was too steep and there were too many runaway trains.  They decided to build a tunnel that does a spiral circle and construction started at both sides at the same side and when they reached each other they were only off 5 cms.... and this was back in 1908.


As we continued along we eventually went through Rogers Pass.  As many of you reading this blog know, I am a bit of planner and read lots of books before this trip.  I am always very interested in the places that I read about and this was one of them.  It was so neat traveling through a number of tunnels that were built so that avalanches wouldn't cover the road.  At it's highest we had reached 1350 M and I can tell the van was working hard pulling us and all our gear up that hill.

Andrea and David wondered if our neighbor Darren ever caught one this big

We stopped in Revelstoke for supper and found a lovely park where the kids could play and we ate supper.  Tanya's brother Rodney had asked while we were visiting what we were eating for meals on the road.  Tonight it was Penne with chicken, red peppers in a white cream sauce.  It hit the spot after a day of hiking, exploring and driving.  Although there were lots of activities to do in the Revelstoke area, there wasn't any on our list so we decided to keep driving to Kamloops.


We arrived just after 8:00 pm and the thermostat on the van told us it was still 33 C outside.  The highest we saw today was 34 C.  We arrived at our hotel (we are still in bear country and therefore camping is out of the question), and went to the pool where the kids just love to play.  They are all tucked in for the night and Tanya and I are reading the Kamloops and area books to plan our day tomorrow.  It's hard to believe that we know have traveled to all the Provinces in Canada (by including our trip to NL and NS last summer).  It's been a bucket list item of ours and now we can scratch it off.


We still get lots of comments when people see and hear we are from PEI.  Tonight while checking in at our hotel the young guy said he was in Summerside for the student leadership conference a few years back and really enjoyed it. 


Thanks for all your notes and well wishes, the kids have been having too much fun playing to write in the blog but we hope to make some time tomorrow for them to write.  Merci a Mme Eva pour tous vos messages.  David (et nous) aime beaucoup de les recevoirs.


Looking forward to catching up with some friends in Vancouver later in the week or over the weekend.


Later,
Francois