Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Day 15 Summer 2010 Park to Park Road Trip

I am using the new “beta” version of Windows Live Writer to write this blog, so if things appear different on your end, I apologize ahead of time. There will be a learning curve to get through before I am fully competent with how this new version works.

We woke up early and left our hotel in Golden BC and are heading back into Banff National Park to visit a copule of areas that we didn’t see yesterday.

Along the Trans Canada Highway they are building these double tunnels, the purpose of which is for the wildlife to pass safely over the highway. All along the highway they have built tall fences and this funnels the wildlife towards these overpasses for them to use.

0252 TC 1 from Golden BC to Banff NP

First stop inside Banff National Park is Lake Louise. Very peaceful and tranquil, with one canoeist paddling across the lake as I took my photos.

0255 Lake Louise Banff National Park AB0266 Lake Louise Banff National Park AB Stitch0272 Lake Louise Banff National Park AB0271 Lake Louise Banff National Park AB

Here are some more shots of the construction crews building the wildlife pathways over the Trans Canada Highway.

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We drove to the village of Banff.

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We bought tickets for the Banff Gondola ride. The views from on top are spectacular as you will see in these photos.

0303 Banff Gondola BNP AB Stitch0317 Banff Gondola BNP AB0318 Banff Gondola BNP AB

After the Gondola ride we headed back into downtown Banff to check out an ice cream shop. According to Readers Digest, this store has the best ice cream in Canada. The name is Cow’s and everything including the flavours of ice cream have a cow theme.

0331 Cows Banff National Park AB0334 Cows Banff National Park AB0336 Cows Banff National Park AB

We agree with Readers Digest… the best !! Rich and Creamy mmmmmmooooooooo

0341 Cows Banff National Park AB0342 Cows Banff National Park AB0343 Cows Banff National Park AB

Although we did not stop at The Banff Springs Hotel, we did find an overlook so we could take some photos. That place is too rich for our blood, but it is an iconic photo opportunity.

0350 Banff Springs Hotel BNP AB

We took a drive along Tunnel Mountain Road in hopes of finding some wildlife but instead, we found HOODOO’S

What the heck is a Hoodoo you ask… well this should explain it.

0361 Hoodoos Banff National Park AB0359 Hoodoos Banff National Park AB

And here for your viewing enjoyment is a Hoodoo.

0366 Hoodoos Banff National Park AB0367 Hoodoos Banff National Park AB

We will be seeing more Hoodoos later this summer, one of the National Parks in the US that we will be visiting has hundreds, maybe thousands of Hoodoos.

We watched as a little chipmunk entertained us and begged for food.

0369 Banff National Park AB0371 Banff National Park AB

We left Banff National Park and headed West towards Yoho National Park. I had never heard of Yoho but we are about to find out what it is all about.

0394 Yoho National Park BC

As I learnt today, Yoho National Park contains the spiral tunnels of the Kicking Horse Pass. Trains heading East and West come up and over the Kicking Horse Pass using a series of spiral tunnels. You can enlarge the photos to read the descriptions of how the tunnels were built and why.

0399 Sprial Tunnels Kicking Horse Pass YNP BC0400 Sprial Tunnels Kicking Horse Pass YNP BC0401 Sprial Tunnels Kicking Horse Pass YNP BC

There are 2 tunnels in view of this lookout. We watched a train heading down and it entered the tunnel furthest away in the photo and came out the closest tunnel. Sort of like a partial figure 8. I will also include 1 video, you can watch the train enter the tunnel and then see it coming out as it loops back on itself. I like trains, so this is all very fascinating to me.

0403 Sprial Tunnels Kicking Horse Pass YNP BC0405 Sprial Tunnels Kicking Horse Pass YNP BC0404 Sprial Tunnels Kicking Horse Pass YNP BC


Kicking Horse Pass


After watching the train pass through the tunnels, it was time to move on or another train would be along soon and I would have to stay and watch that one also.

We were curious to see what a “Natural Bridge” is so we drove through a part of Yoho National Park to get to one. Very interesting, the rushing water has bored a hole through the rock and formed a natural bridge.

0434 Natural Bridge Yoho National Park BC0439 Natural Bridge Yoho National Park BC0443 Natural Bridge Yoho National Park BC

A video of the water rushing through Natural Bridge is available on my Flickr Site.

So that pretty much concludes our day, we returned to our hotel in Golden BC. In the morning we will get back on the Trans Canada Highway and head West, through Glacier National Park and Revelstoke National Park.

To see all of our photos and videos from today, you can see them on my FLICKR site.

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