Johnston Canyon trail to Ink pots - Banff highlight

The previous post in this series is here..

After visiting Lake Louise, Lake Moraine and doing the Paradise valley hike, we drove to Johnston Canyon. We knew what we had to do..

Hike to lower falls, then upper falls and depending on how we were doing at that time, go all the way to Ink pots. Given we had already hiked 6+ miles by then, this was going to be another 8 miles. Our decision was to go at a steady pace.

Lower falls came and went,

we cross the river and then go along it on a catwalk

There is a small tunnel you go through (there is a line) and you get to see the falls up close and personal..

Then we start towards upper falls. It is a decent, easy to moderate hike to Upper falls.  At this point the crowd has already thinned down and most people turn back..Upper falls is beautiful.. 

tried a few long exposure shots..

we walk to the top of the falls and then deviate from the river to go up the mountain range..

Ink pots deserves a blog post of its own, but given the rate at which I am able to blog, just going to write this as one long post..

you walk past Upper falls through a meadow with flowers that has an amazing vista!

Maybe 10% of folks go past Upper falls to Inkpots, as it is considered a hard hike. We had to go.. San for one actually offered to turn back, but I refused. It is not everyday I am coming to Banff, so off we went. 

The scenery that awaits you once you reach is worth it.. there are 5 to 6 pools of different depths which have different shades of blue and green because of the sediment and the depth of the pools.. the reflections of the mountains in the pools makes for amazing pictures.. I composed this shot and asked a college kid to take this picture.. my camera was on the floor at one end of the pool.. once she saw the end result, she requested me to take the same shot on her phone.. before you know it, there was a line for that!  San was impressed by my photo composing skills for once!

some more shots at this beautiful location..(you can see it in the video also)

we were really happy we did this hike! 

A video of the hike..

It was a hard hike only because it goes up and straight down to a valley to Ink pots. That means you climb up, climb down and up again on the way back. That saps you mentally. 

Fortunately for us, we met an amazing local couple who were senior to us, but do this hike regularly. We started talking to them and while San and Mr. Local started walking faster, I really hit it off with Mrs. Local and we just kept talking and walking. The last 4 miles was a breeze.. before we knew it, we were down and almost 30 minutes ahead of when we thought we will get down. Sometimes, a great conversationalist is all that is required to get me moving fast again! I didnt take a single photo on the way back. Just walked and talked. 

We really enjoyed their company and had lunch with them. We had packed parathas from Indian Curry house and they had their packed lunch. We decided to stay in touch and started driving back towards Banff. Our plan (which they thought was going to be luck driven, given parking and ticket availability) was to go to the Gondola and go up Sulfur mountain! 

More on that later.. 

This is a must see place in Banff.. the Ink pots is a hard hike, but don't miss it. Take enough water and pace yourself and go.. 

We made friends for life on this trip and that made it all the more special!

Paradise Valley

The previous post in this series is here..

After taking in the beauty of Lake Louise and Lake Moraine, we had an hour. So we decided to hike the Paradise valley trail. 

This trail goes to a beautiful vista point after an approximately 3 mile hike and eventually connects at a fork to Lake Louise or Lake Moraine. The hike towards Moraine goes to an amazing ledge viewpoint after a few more miles. We did not have time to go there.. but we will definitely on a future trip. 

This trail was lush green along a boistrous creek.  Every now and then there is a path that goes to the rivers edge. We hiked up to the bridge, admired the river and walked back. 

The sun was just starting to come out..one side was bright and that made for interesting views..

Now we were late on our schedule, but at this point, San decided to go with a flexible approach.. "we see what we can see" was the new motto.

A short video of the creek and our drive back.. they have beautiful animal crossing bridges on this freeway to avoid animals and people losing their lives.. these overpasses have trees on them and the animals cross over safely.. hope the US also adopts this in places like Yosemite..

We had not had anything to eat till this point. So we decided to eat some snacks while driving slowly towards the next stop.. Johnston canyon. 

Johnston canyon gets us practically back to Banff town. We had covered the farther points and that meant not much driving left..just a lot of hiking!

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..