Lake Louise and Lake Moraine

The previous post in this series is here..

Finally getting started on day 3 of our Banff trip posts. 

We had a rental car and this was our full day of planned activiteis where we were going to be on our own. The idea of having an entire days agenda under San's control, where I tag along without saying "No" to anything (part of the agreed terms of the trip) was scary. 

My idea of visiting a lot of places in one day, involves going to the Patel points, getting pictures and moving to next place. San has changed. She plans a 2 to 3 mile hike in every place from the parking lot to some place within the park at every one of these locations. Now that I got that out of my system, it is actually a good idea if I can keep up. The pictures are better, as is the experience (I am saying this on my own... she is not looking over my shoulder! really!)

We got up at 5 AM, drank some Wagh Bakri instant tea (we have started to like this tea on travels now) and started driving towards Lake Louise and Lake Moraine. Our plan was to go to the farthest point first which was Moraine. We drove all the way up to see a cop divert us. The parking was full apparently at 6:30 AM when we reached the place. "Lake Lousie still has some parking left.. if you go there you will make it".. is what he said and we zipped there.

We were in a long line at the vending machine. There were folks who were sending back people to go get the license plates of the rental cars as the machine asks you to enter it. I stopped a few of them and said "please look at your key from rental car.. usually the license number is written on it". This saved some time as the people were blocking the machine waiting for a person to come back with info!! American tourists understandably get a bad name in Banff.

We walked to the trailhead towards the lake and were just dazed by the view of the lake. It was just so serene and beautiful.

There were already groups of folks taking pictures at the lake front. We walked around the lake to a less crowded place and got some pictures.

After walking around the lake and looking at the giant hotel in front of the lake, we decided to head back towards Banff.

On the way back, surprisingly the cop said "we have two spots open. you can go to Lake Moraine!". It was our lucky day. So we drove from the main freeway to Lake Moraine parking which is a good 15-20 minute drive. Once there, the parking lot incharge says "we made a miscalculation. we let two extra folks in by mistake". We told him "we are here to go see the lake, take pictures and leave. Need 20 mins tops!". So he relented and let us park for 20 mins in the loading zone and said "I am going to stand here near your car. So please be back!". 

We ran in towards the lake, saw similar crowd, started walking around lake to the farthest point we could in 6 minutes and got some photos and ran back. While this lake is very similar to the Lake Louise in the way it looks, it has a more rocky feel to it. It is also a lot quieter. 

There are many trails that take you to the high points in the local mountains around.. so you get a birds eye view of the lake. We did not have time to do such a hike here. Going to Banff for just a weekend, limited us timewise. This was more of a sampler trip!

We kept our promise and started driving back.

Both these lakes are absolutely breathtaking. Plan to spend a few hours at each lake, go on a trail, do a little picnic around the place if possible!

Our next was supposed to be Johnston canyon and a long hike there.. but we were early. On the way out of Moraine lake, there is a hike in Paradise valley. We decided to hike this trail. 

will post that next..

Two lakes and a waterfall

The previous post on this series is here..

The bus stopped at a waterfall that flows into a river (where they Freeway goes between the two). This was followed by two more stops at Bow lake and Waterfowl lakes. 

Both these lakes looked similar except for the extent of the "lake beaches" and the picnicing crowds. The scenery was just amazing!

This photograph is thanks to the Belgian professor.. his daughter was telling to him take some vertical and horizontal.. he goes "will even take some diagonal.. how about that?". Turned out great!

We met a large punjabi family of 30+ people with picnic blankets and food spread out in one of the little coves around the lake. We were given half an hour at the stop and everyone in the bus interested in taking photos at the lake had to walk through one of many trails to get to the shore and take pictures. We thought we were going to a quiet spot.. turned out not to be. so we went back around to find a quiet spot to take photos. 

Both these lakes are beautiful. Turqoise waters, clear enough for you to see the bottom pebbles for quite a distance, snow and ice covered mountains in the background..

San's candid shot of me at Waterfowl lakes

Surprisingly, she took a lot of photos of me on this trip and they were all good! Not out of focus, not contrasty, over or under exposed.. just right! That was a big bonus for me on this trip!

if you are not going by the bus tour, stop by both these lakes! There is enough parking in the parking lot at bow lake. For Waterfowl lake, you just stop at the vista point and walk down. 

A video of the stops 

The day wasn't over. We still had lot to do after being dropped off..

A drive on Ice field Parkway

On day 2 of the Banff trip, we were booked on a bus tour to see the Athabasca Glacier. Will write a separate post on the Glacier itself. This post is about the what we saw on the almost all day drive to the place. 

The previous post on this trip is here..

We started at 8AM. We did not know they had a pickup point right outside our hotel. We could have got more sleep! Instead we parked downtown and paid dearly for it. The bus had 23 people plus the driver in it. By the end of the day we were all introduced to everyone and we all got to talk at the various stops. It was an international crowd, folks from BC Canada, Brazil, Australia, UK, Belgium and the two of us representing the US!

The driver was a local 20 year old kid, doing this as a summer job. Hindsight being 20/20, we realized at the glacier that we could have just driven to the Glacier ride point in our rental car in an hour and 15 minutes with stops on the way and saved a good 2 hours to do something else. While it is true that there is only one company that is allowed to ride the monster trucks on the Glacier (Columbia IceField), you don't have to go in a bus from Banff to that place!! You can directly go there and get tickets. 

That said, we still enjoyed being passengers, interacting with strangers and stopping at all these points that the kid stopped the bus at, which we would not have otherwise seen. (he took us to vista points that were not the main parking lots.. which helped get great shots with no crowd in the background!). So from that point, it was a big plus. The only time we could have saved was for waiting for 23 people getting in and out of the bus at every stop instead of just the two of us. The kid did a great job of entertaining us during the drive! 

There was a much bigger plus. He stopped when he saw a car slow down in front of us (I would not have) and we got to see a bear walk by us, up  close and personal.. that was the highlight of the drive.

We also had lunch at a nice quiet picnic spot next to the river. 

This drive on Ice field parkway is very scenic. We go all along the bow river all the way from Banff to Jasper National park. The drive in the car would have taken 2 1/2 hours, but we started at 8 and reached at 12:30 including all the photo stops. 

The spots we could not stop at on the way up, we did on the way down. 

First stop: The Lake Louise Village visitor center. This place had a bunch of places to get breakfast and coffee and it was the first rest stop after an hour plus of driving. Every place had a long line. We were lucky to get some breakfast in the Trailhead Cafe, where the line was at least moving! San had a Vegan Samosa which she rated highly!

We started all smiles.. a good sign. This was in the parking lot waiting for the bus. Did I mention we were early? This is also a "warmup selfie" !

Next stop: Herbert lake

We walked through spruce and aspen tree lined trails to the lake (this was our first of many such lake shore visits over the next 48 hours!)

the path ends and voila... the shades of green and blue and the transparent water hits you!

Next stop.. lunch at Coleman creek..

Next stop (more like slow down..) BEAR!! Unfortunately we could not open the windows in the bus.. this is the best I could get with the SLR from the other side of the bus through a tinted window.. it was an exciting thing for us to see this bear walk along the freeway!

at this point I would like to mention that we were expecting to see a lot of animals on the drive.. but the only other non human creature we saw during that day was this ground squirrel at the lunch stop near the river. 

Last but one stop was a waterfalls across the mountains.. there was a family of four from Belgium. The couple and their two daughters exactly 3 years older than our two girls. Their girls helped us take a lot of photos. This was a good shot of us.. no falls, but I love this picture .. so it goes in the blog!

A video that captures all these stops including the "bear sighting". 

If you want to do things fast, just go by yourself from Banff to Jasper. (then again, you might save an hour tops.. given you have to get a pass .. the bus already had a pass and was waved in).  If you want to just sit back, relax and meet folks and go at a slow pace (if you have more than two days to cover the place), then take the bus tour from Banff. It is actually a decent experience.  They also give you a packed lunch, water bottles etc. (Veggie option included, which again was rated highly by San). 

We enjoyed the drive and the group of people we ended up with!

Now that I am able to sit at a laptop and write longer posts, going to get back to the routine! The next post on the actual Glacier walk tomorrow..