Visiting Wild America: Icefields Parkway, Banff

My second full day was spend mostly driving up the Icefields Parkway in Banff. This 120km stretch of highway goes from Lake Louise in the center of Banff National Park and connects to Jasper National Park at its northern limit, at which point the increase in elevation that one has climbed over the past hour or so of driving affords views of some amazing glaciers that come down into the valley like fingers from the main Columbian Icefield, which is hidden behind the mountains. Well I thought that driving into Banff was nice? Well, the mountains outdid themselves again. The icefields parkway has been described by some as the most spectacular drive in all of north america. And I can't argue with that. The drive up exceeded my expectations. Many of the mountains just came shooting out of the ground of the valley floor, creating sheer walls with table tops on top, with glaciers seeping over these table edges. It's all subalpine up here too, so all coniferous trees, due to the high elevation.

Driving up the Icefields Parkway

Athabasca Glacier

Zoom in of the glacier. Those tiny things up there in the middle of the picture are tour buses

Lake Louise. Way too many tourists for me

Harlequin Ducks. These ducks live on mountain streams during the summer, swimming through dangerous raids

Global warming? Your call.

And the lakes! Oh the lakes! They are all a turqoise blue-green, the result of glacial water melt. Combine all of this together and you get one of the most dramatic drives possible. Just one fantastic view after another. I tried to limit the number of times I stopped to take photos, but I couldnt help myself. The hour or so drive took me over two hours just to make it to the Columbian Icefield. Admittedly, you could only see a tiny bit of the whole icefield. But a finger of it known as the Athabasca Glacier extends down into the valley. It's hard to express even in photos the magnitude of the glacier and the surrounding mountains. From my vantage point of the glacier, the massive snow treading tour buses that ferried tourists onto the glacier looked like tiny specks. The glacier must have been a mile wide and two miles deep. I didnt do the trip onto the glacier itself, that was too expensive. Instead, I hiked the Wilcox trail up the other side of the valley, into the alpine meadows where no trees grow. From here you feel like youre in a completely different world, surrounded by barren rock, low growing flowers, and big horn sheep. And I had awesome views of the glacier. I stayed up at the Icefields til around 8 before heading back to my campsite at the southern end of the parkway. The drive back was faster, but I still couldnt help but stop a few times for more photos. What a fantastic day.