Banff National Park

Banff National Park is Canada's oldest national park, established in 1885 in the Rocky Mountains.  Over the past few million years, glaciers have at times covered most of the park but today are found only on the mountain slopes though they include the Columbia Icefield, the largest uninterrupted glacial mass in the Rockies.

Our first three nights were spent at the Chateau Lake Louise.  The hotel was originally built in the late 1800s by the Canadian Pacific Railway.  We arrived in the dark but woke to this view the next morning and hustled out to the lake for a picture and to enjoy this location before all the tourists and tour busses arrived.

We were able to take walks and drives in this scenic area and saw so many critters along the
road:  big horn sheep, mountain goat, black bears, grizzlies, a moose, elk, deer and a bald eagle along with, did I already mention the beautiful majestic views?!

The color of the water in these glacial lakes is breathtaking.

This was the pathway on the right side of the lake where we found many wooden benches where I could rest and just enjoy the view while walking to the end of the lake.

The picture below is of the Victoria Glacier.

There were all sorts of nice people walking the trail allowing for us to take pictures of them and asking them to do the same for us.

This was us at the end of our 1.2 mile walk to the end of Lake Louise and then the return walk to the hotel - great to be able to do.

This picture was taken at Moraine Lake and Valley of the Ten Peaks.

I was in the car for this picture with the window rolled down.  You'll see the grizzly in the middle of the picture.  It was munching away on new leaf growth.  There is another grizzly back and left of the one in the middle.  I was just getting ready to roll my window up and the bear turned around.

This is a picture of the Columbia Icefield.  They take snow cat tours out on the glacier which you can see in the middle and a little left in the picture.

Maligne Lake

We saw quite a bit of snow one morning.  

The below picture is of Bow Lake - lots of ice still on the lake.

Our final night, we found really nice cabins along this river and there was a vacancy!  Went for a stroll along the river path, had a great dinner but it was too cool to sit our here and enjoy an end of the day glass of wine - so pretty though!

We returned home to warm temperatures.  We sure enjoyed our Banff weather: sun, rain and snow!  I have some doctor appointment next week and then we'll decide what our next trip is going to be.  I have a feeling it involves northwest Nebraska?