Life on the Road: Leaving Banff

After two weeks in Banff we are on the move back into the United States. I would have to say that Banff is probably one of the most beautiful places I have visited. The scenery was amazing. In my previous post I told you about some sightseeing we did our first few days here. During our second week our friends from Idaho visited us for the remainder of our stay. For some reason they brought bad weather with them as it rained just about every day they were here but it did not hinder us from getting out. From our sources we learned that must sees were the Bow Valley Parkway, the Icefields Parkway, Lake Louise and Moraine Lake. We did all those plus walking around the Banff Springs Hotel, riding the Banff Gondola and visiting the Banff Hot Springs. In addition there were drives touring the area, walks and bike rides.

I took way more pictures than I could ever begin to show you in this blog so I will give you some highlights to give you a flavor of the area and highly recommend that if you get the chance you should come visit the area.

Here is us at Lake Louise

Moraine Lake

Friendly animals along the road on a drive near our campsite.

The Icefields Parkway is a highway between Lake Louise and Jasper and runs for 142 miles. We drove to the mid-point, Icefields Centre, and then returned to Banff. The beauty of the drive is that there are numerous waterfalls along the way, very high snow capped mountains and glaciers. It is called the Icefields Parkway because on top of the mountains are huge icefields that have glaciers coming off of them between the mountains. Unless you are in a helicopter or airplane you do not see the icefields but you do see the glaciers. At the Icefields Centre we were able to walk to the edge of one.