Tuesday 29 April
Off to the Rockies today. Picked up the car from Hertz which is only a 10 minute walk away from our apartment. We originally ordered a Toyota Corolla/ Mazda type vehicle, however when we asked for a GPS we were given a Dodge Dart. Quite a nice car.
Dodge Dart - Photo taken at the beginning of day 2. Not as clean as this on return
Very interesting driving on the wrong side of the road. A bit like driving in a mirror. Karen gave us some good advice. Righty tighty, lefty loosey. In other words when turning right you turn tightly and keep to the right side of the road and when turning left you must turn wide. Canadians seem to use their horns a lot, however for the whole trip we didn't get beeped once (that we heard anyway). Didn't frighten ourselves much, don't know about other drivers.
Headed east on Canadian Highway 1 East. Great road, multi lane and a very good surface. Kept to the right lane most of the time as this kept us prety well on track.
There were snow capped mountains in sight straight from the start.
Heading out on Highway 1 East
Very sensible speeds in most places. The speed zones varied, 50 km/h through built up areas, and the highway speed varied from 90 to 110 km/h. I would say that if broken down to percentages 60% of the trip would have been 90, 25% 100 and 15% 110. Most of the time the speed zones were indicated really well.
You don't have to worry much about the Highway Patrol over here. We did just under 2000 km and saw 3, 2 on the side of the road and we were passed by a pickup truck marked as Highway patron in Alberta.
We decided to head for a town called Salmon Arm. On the map it appeard to be quite small but ended up being quite a size. It was larger than Gunnedah, I would say approaching Tamworth in size. Evidently it got it's name because there so many salmon that the farmers were able to fertilise their fields with them. I think that might be a fishy tale.
The road was pretty fair in most places, however the road markings were a little faint which made it difficult to see where you should be at times, particularly because of the unfamiliar position on the road. They have a good system of marking. The centreline is yellow with the other lines indicating the lanes white. It is very easy to follow when these lines can be seen.
Dual Carriageway - Yellow line left of carriageway, white lane markings.
More traffic lanes and a mountain or two
From October 1st to 30th April there are some restrictions put on motorists travelling through the mountains. You must have either all weather tyres, (they spell them tires here), winter tyres or chains. There are areas on the side of the road for the vehicles to pull over and put the chains on.
Chain Up Area sign
Frozen Lake - Outside temperature about 14 deg C
Approaching Salmon Arm we were travelling alongside a some lakes. When we got to the town we found out that it was one lake, Shuswap (pronounced shoe swap), which has an area of over 300 sq km and a average depth of 131 m.
There is so much water around. There were lakes or rivers close to the road most of the way. I don't think they would know what a drought would be, although we did pass through a town that seemed dry and when we researched it, the town was in a rain shadow and didn't get a lot of rain or snow.
The first day of our trip through the Rockies was a totally different drive to what we have eperienced in the past. The snow covered scenery was spectacular.
Wednesday 30 April
Off to Banff today. Decided to have a look through Salman Arm before leaving and also see the local tourist information and enquire about the road through to Banff.
According to Google there was a curved wharf on the shores of Lake Shuswap and we were directed to it from the Tourist Information Centre. The wharf itself is a wooden structure and from the signs on the side must be used mostly during the summer. There were quite a few moorings adjacent that were used for boats and seadoo type craft.
The curved wharf at Salmon Arm (Lake Shuswap)
Lake Shuswap looking east
We walked to the end of the wharf and on the way back we saw what looked like a dog just getting out of the water. On closer inspection I could see that it wasn't a dog but a beaver.
Beaver at Lake Shuswap
The Lake Shuswap Beaver
As we left the wharf a nice Canadian Gentleman told us of an osprey that was in a tree about 20 metres away, so with cameras in hand we headed for the tree.
Lake Shuswap Osprey
After the excitement of seeing this wildlife we headed off towards Lake Louise and Banff. The road to Banff was equally spectacular as the day before. Snow covered mountains everywhere.
Frozen lake at the side of the highway
Another view out of the window.
Some interesting signs that we don't often see:
Saw a lot of these
Only saw one of these
There were signs for moose as well but weren't quick enough to photograph them
We arrived in Banff late in the afternoon after passing Lake Louise. It was evident that it was between seasons over here because there was a lot of snow and slush around and all the trails to the lake seemed to be covered in a coating of very slipery ice. With our shoes we decided to give walking a bit of a miss. I didn't have waterproof trousers and I could see myself being on my bum quite a bit of the time.
Thursday 1 May
Banff is set in a spectacular area. I thought looking down one of the main streets in vancouver was spectacular. The view down the Main Street of Banff is even better.
Main Street of Banff (I was standing on the median strip)
Last night looking through things to do in Banff Deb saw some information about the Banff Gondola. The lower terminal is located 1583 m above sea level and the upper terminal is 2281 m above sea level. We decided that it might be something to see. There is a board walk going from the upper terminal to an old weather station on the summit which is a comfortable 1 km walk. (They forgot to mention the steps)
In the car park of the gondola terminal there was a bus used for the glacier tours. They would be handy to have in peak hour traffic anywhere in the world.
Ice Explorer Bus used on the glacier tours
The day was clear and warm. Both Deb and I were only wearing short sleeved shirts and jeans and the outside temperature must have been in the high teens. The views were spectacular.
Another sign not often seen in Australia
The walk mentioned earlier started at the gondola terminal and went to an old weather station. There were 82 steps going down to a platform and then 258 steps up to the weather station. It was fairly easy as there were platforms every 10 steps or so. A total of 340 steps there and then we had to do another 340 steps back!!
The weather station is on the peak in the distance
The depth of the snow on Sulphur Mountain
Looking down from the weather station (East)
Example of the snow on Sulphur Mountain
I could put another 160 photographs taken on the day but!!!!
We decided to head for Drumheller further into Alberta Province. It has some interesting geological formations called hoodoos. A hoodoo is a tall, thin spire of rock that protrudes from the bottom of an arid drainage basin or badland. Drumheller is located in the badlands.
Entry Road into Drumheller.
There is also a museum housing a large collection of dinosaur bones.
Friday 2 May
Woke up to very wet morning. It had been raining all night and we had been warned by the receptionist at the Motel that things could be muddy underfoot. Most of the attractions like the history museum didn't open until 10.00 o'clock so we decided to see the free ones first. The hoodoos and the suspension bridge.
The hoodoos looked like the towers of rock depicted in the movies of the Wild West.
Hoodoo
View of the Hoodoos - Shows the strata of the land around
The start of Hoodoos - It will take a while for more hoodoos to form, maybe not in our lifetime but eventually
The suspension bridge east of Drumheller
The mine head that the suspension bridge served.
Originally miners rowed across to go to work at the mine and the coal was rowed back across the river to the rail line. The suspension bridge was installed to allow the miners easier access to the mine in the early 1900's and was in use until the mine closed in 1957.
View of the river the miners had to row across
Once we had seen the Hoodoos and the suspension bridge we reviewed the time it might take us to return to Vancouver. We had already decided to go as far as Revelstoke that night which was a little over half way about 6 and a half hours drive. We thought that with the inclement weather and our inexperience with driving on the right it might be a good idea to start back. We could always come back next visit to Canada.
We had quite an interesting drive. It rained a lot, it snowed a little, we had some sun, quite a variety of weather conditions. The trip was quite uneventful. There were a couple of overhead warning signs that indicated that the highway was going to be closed at the Glacier National Park from 2.00 pm to 5.00 pm. Weren't sure where it was but didn't think it would affect our travel plans.
A big chunk of hill removed for the highway
Netting on the side of the cutting to protect vehicles on highway
We arrived at the Glacier Resort at about 3.15 pm and were told to follow the car in front into the car park. There were already a number of trucks and cars either on the road or in the car park. We were told it would be between 1 and 2 hours. They were doing controlled avalanches in order to make the road safe. There was the sound of a helicopter and there were a number of explosions.
The wait wasn't too bad. There was a Rangers Station about 100 m away from where we were parked and there were toilets there. The outside temperature was 4 degrees according to the car. We had our iPads so we were able to fill in the time. The first couple of hours went by reasonably quickly but the next 2 and a half hours dragged on a bit.
We finally left the car park at 7.45 pm.
View of the car park at Glacier Resort
Another view of the car park - Height of snow about 1.8 m
There were lots of vehicles leaving the car park and I was amazed that the departure was very orderly. Although the speed limit on the road was 90 km/h all the cars kept to bout 80 km/h and there was no passing or cutting in and out. The passing didn't start to begin until well away from the avalanche area.
If you look closely you will notice some darker areas of snow where there had been avalanches.
This is the result of a Control Avalanche - The concrete barrier is the divider between the up and down roads. 2 lanes are under the snow.
Road cleared of avalanche
The remainder of the trip was uneventful. Our planned arrival in Revelstoke was between 4.30 pm and 5.00 pm, however we didn't arrive until 8.45 pm. It was lucky that we had booked ahead because there were quit a few vehicles waiting to travel west. Some of them were turning around and heading back to Revelstoke looking for accommodation as that road hadn't been cleared and it wouldn't be until the early hours of the morning.
Saturday 3 May
Had to get fuel before we left Revelstoke. Got a bit low, about one eighth of a tank when we arrived. Not sure where the next fuel was. There have been a couple of places where signs have indicated that there is no fuel for 150 km. Not sure if this was one of those places.
Set off at about 8.15 am, hoping to be able to drop off the car at the Hertz office near to our apartment at 4.00 pm. There is an alternative after hours drop off point but it is quite a few blocks away from us. Again the trip was not too bad with rain, some sleet (not much) and a little bit of occasional sunshine.
Had a reasonable run, stopped for lunch at a small town called Hope. I reckon it would be about the same size as Tenterfield or Glen Innes. We had lunch at a small cafe called Sharon's Cafe and Deli. Deb had a BLT and I had an egg bacon and cheese sandwich.
Bacon Lettuce and Tomato
Egg, bacon and cheese on Kaisers
I have never been served a sandwich accompanied with watermelon and chips before. It was a nice lunch. Sharon came over to us because it was a little obvious we were not locals and asked us to put our names on a map of the world. At the end of the year they take a photograph and start a new map. Quite a nice thing to do I thought.
The town has a number of wooden sculptures throughout. Outside the cafe was a sculpture and across from where we had lunch there was a park with a number of them.
One side of the sculpture outside the cafe.
The other side of the sculpture
Everyone in Canada seem proud of their bears
Memorial to a Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) Dog
Story of Chip the Police Dog
The rest of the trip to Vancouver was a bit hectic. The rain was coming down and the traffic was as bad as Sydney peak hour (or so it seemed to me). We didn't get back in time to drop off the car near our place so we took our time to unload it then return it down town.
The trip through the Rockies was incredible. It will be done again on our next trip back here.
I'll catch up with the rest of our adventures very shortly.
Deb and Den
