August 27th

. . . and we have had the most wonderful time!

So, here we are back in Vancouver with yet another 'block' of our grand tour completed and what a fantastic trip it has been. The word awesome, in its original and 'proper' sense kept leaping into our heads as we encountered time and again the almost unbelievable beauty created by the forces of nature. I know that sounds completely manufactured and over the top, but it is so true!

We finished our last post as we arrived in Jasper, which we discovered was a very pleasant town - another example of a tourist destination which had not become tacky. Unfortunately, smoke from the BC fires continued to be a problem and after checking the weather forecast the night we arrived, we decided to change our plans completely. Friday the 20th therefore saw us heading down the Icefields Parkway towards Lake Louise instead of prowling around Jasper, as the forecast was for rain on Saturday, the day on which we were to travel down to Banff along the Parkway. As the Icefields Parkway is one of Canada's iconic highways, it would have been very sad for the scenery for which it is so famous to have been obscured by cloud and rain,so we made the decision to drive down and back so if it the weather was no good on Saturday we wouldn't be sad.

Our first stop at the Athabasca Falls set the scene for the journey - the Athabasca River thunders through a narrow gorge cut through the rock over milennia.

As we continued the smoke was less thick so we were able to see more and more of the rugged peaks which dominate the drive. We are not going to try and describe every wonderful sight as this blog would go on far too long! Suffice to say that every bend in the Icefields Parkway revealed a view more stunning than the last. By the time we reached Lake Louise we had seen it all - towering mountain peaks, huge rushing rivers, wide meandering rivers, plunging waterfalls, massive glaciers flowing over the edges of mountains, wildlife (we saw a Black Bear feeding on berries by the side of the road) and lakes the colour of which is breathtaking because of the 'rock flour' from glacial action suspended in the water. For visitors from a dry, ancient land like ours this was scenery to take the breath away.

We reached Lake Louise at the southern end of the Parkway and it is as beautiful as the tourist brochures say - a huge lake, teal coloured in the sunlight. There were, however, way too many people for us so we took yet more photos, grabbed a coffee and started the 230kms back to Jasper, happy with our decision as we had been rewarded with a largely sunny day.

Friday's sightseeing in Jasper was seriously compromised by smoke and as our B and B host Connie said to us 'it was a day for looking down, not up'. We did therefore enjoy Maligne Canyon, claimed to be one of the most spectacular gorges in the Canadian Rockies, but the other much-lauded sights were fairly well obscured. We did, however, see some wonderful wild animals as we drove around - another Black Bear, a male Mule Deer, female and young Elk and a family of Loons feeding on a lake.

Saturday we travelled back down the Parkway and as we got further south the smoke was less and less. We took Kim and Andy's advice and travelled up to Bow Summit to see Peyto Lake and talk about a scene too good to be true! This photo, which is an 'autostitch' of three separate photos, looks as if we have tampered with the colour of the water.

 

Decided we should visit Moraine Lake, which is near Lake Louise, despite the hordes we knew would be there and what an inspired decision - a Grizzly Bear crossed the road in front of us, climbed up the bank and proceeded to eat berries! How lucky were we? Murray keeps insisting that it is good timing and planning - nothing to do with luck!

We had the next two nights in Banff and we enjoyed this far more than we thought we would. The mountains around here are quite different - huge, grey, imposing limestone peaks with much less vegetation. Weather was a bit varied, but there were plenty of sightseeing opportunites between showers and we saw . . . yes, more wild animals! Male, female and young Big Horn Sheep, a huge male Elk with massive antlers and a White-tailed Deer.

We also encountered the Black-billed Magpie, a lovely bird which reminded us more of Choughs than our magpies. Also saw a couple of Loons (very far away!) and a Blue Heron. We have been constantly disappointed by the few birds we have spied though, even though we have been in extensive forest areas and checked out heaps of wetlands. Maybe the water is too cold up here for the macro-invertebrates the wetland birds need? We need to have a Gordon or a Brian Thomas travelling with us to answer the constant questions which arise!

We left Banff last Sunday and travelled back to Lake Louise via the Bow Valley Parkway, stopping off at the amazing Johnston Canyon. From here we turned west on the Trans Canada Highway and after initially thinking that we were in 'gentler' terrain, we found ourselves crossing from Alberta back into British Columbia and the Kootenay National Park (don't you just love that name!). By the time we had descended the Kicking Horse Pass (if you are into trains google the Spiral Tunnels and read about how they solved the problem of bringing trains across this pass) and were in the Yoho National Park.

From here we passed through Glacier National Park, with its 430 glaciers and then into Revelstoke National Park. What a surfeit of glorious scenery and incredible mountain travel - it is certainly more exciting than the Icefields Parkway in that respect. Walked through a magnificent area of old growth Western Red Cedar temperate rainforest (unusual because it is so far from the coast) and were once again horrified that people can bring their dogs into national parks in this country. Horror of horrors, we even saw a cat tethered to a huge RV in a camping area along the Icefields Parkway, which is in the Jasper and Banff National Parks!

On to Revelstoke, a lovely little mountain town where we stayed the night and enjoyed one of the best nights of music ever (Balnarring Musos' Nights excluded of course). A Vancouver band called Blackberry Wood played in the Grizzly Plaza from 7 - 10 and what a fantastically exciting band they were. Murray appointed himself their publicist for the night and flogged their CD to the crowd - don't know how he could go about organising an Australian tour, but it would be a great idea!

Next morning we got ourselves up the Meadows in the Sky Parkway on Mt Revelstoke before any other pesky tourists, drove up to the car park (seeing a gorgeous Hoary Marmot on the way) and then walked the 1km up to the summit (I didn't care what damage I did to knees, ankles etc - I just wasn't missing out!). What a magic time - 360 degrees of the stunning Columbian Mountains all around, many with snow and glaciers and the wildflower meadows were a sight to behold. The quietness was divine - no noisy tourists with no sense of place to spoil things and to upset the little chipmunks which were darting amongst the undergrowth collecting food.

From here we headed back into Revelstoke to visit the Railway Museum - we are still trying to impress Gordon and Scott with our commitment to trains (a vitally important part of the development of Canada as a nation) and then took off south into the Okanagan Valley, a major area of orchards and vineyards. It seemed to be one long lake - so much water, yet the hills all around looked incredibly dry. We made it to our destination Osoyoos, which is at the southern end of the valley and Canada's only desert. Stayed the night in a wonderful B and B and then the next morning we had a fascinating walk around the Osoyoos Desert Centre and were very lucky (more good planning says Murray!) to see a Gopher Snake crossing the road as we drove in.

Then embarked on the drive back to Vancouver - more mountains, rivers and lakes and arrived back at Kippers and Liette's about 5pm. This has been an amazing part of our trip and because of that I have to apologise for going on and on about it!!!
Today I saw a quote by Emily Carr, one of Canada's foremost landscape artists and it just sums it up perfectly:

There is something bigger than fact:

the underlying spirit,

all it stands for,

the mood, the vastness,

the wildness.

It is unbelievable that we have been here for almost seven weeks and only have our few days in Vancouver and our time on Vancouver Island to go! Will do a final update from there before we head for home on the 8th.

Friday 20 August

Now we have more affordable internet (comes with the accomodation as is usually the case, so we have no excuse!) we will try for more regular updates so we don't have to write so much and our lovely friends don't have to read so much.

On Tuesday morning, after three glorious days in Vancouver, the ever-reliable Kippers delivered us to the station to catch the Rocky Mountaineer train to Jasper, although it turned out to be the wrong station! Fortunately the station we wanted was only five minutes away and we had plenty of time, so we have not sacked him as chauffeur, accomodation-provider, chef and all-around good bloke.


The first day's travel took us to Kamloops at a rather leisurely pace due to a combination of the track continually changing direction, freight trains in front of us and stops at sidings for other freight trains to pass. Of course this leisurely pace all contributed to us taking what now seems like 5,000 photos, most of them duplicates, as we both had our cameras clicking away at the same time. But, first things first - this is meant to be a chronological account of our journey so here we go . . .

On leaving Vancouver, behind three huge deisel locos, we crossed the Fraser River and then proceeded to follow it into the Cascade Mountains. There are two tracks, built by competing companies, from Vancouver right through to Jasper, often side-by-side, but where there was insufficient space, the other company had to take the more difficult route on the opposite side. Although the tracks are still owned by different companies, both now use each other's tracks - one for easterly journeys and one for westerly ones. Engineering out of the way, let's get to the trip!

As we travelled east, the Fraser River became more of a canyon and the line was perched on the edge of Hell's Gate, a narrow gorge through which more water rushes per minute than goes over Niagara Falls.

 From here we travelled on to Cisco Crossing and the bridge over the Jaws of Death Gorge. The very names of these places invoke images of the sort of magnificent scenery we were enjoying, as well as admiration for the engineering expertise of those who planned and built these lines, bridges and tunnels in the late 1800s.

From here we turned east, following the Thomson River and entered an area of semi-arid desert in the rain shadow of the Coastal Mountains. We were not expecting this type of landscape - plateaux rather than mountains, with very little vegetation and native Ponderosa Pines, which had been absolutely devastated by the Pine-beetle, which has ravaged British Columbia's pines since the early 1990s. This landscape was the order of the day right into Kamloops, which was the destination of our first day's travel of some 300 miles.

We did manage some serious wildlife spotting here and many hours were spent hanging out the 'windows' of the platform between carriages. We saw many Osprey (and their wonderful stick nests) and Bald Eagles, both flying and perched in dead pines along the river, a couple of groups of Big Horn Sheep, one Black Bear ambling across a hillside and some Loons (Heff's currently favourite birds) swimming in Lake Kamloops.This is a huge lake, officially regarded as 'bottomless'.

Spent the night in a hotel in Kamloops, a town we won't be rushing back to and boarded the train again at 8am the next morning, ready for another day's adventure. We were extremely lucky to have a wonderfully well-informed and entertaining attendant on our carriage, who fed us and more importantly, shared with us lots and lots of fascinating information about the areas through which we were travelling, the history of those areas and the railways, the flora and fauna and all sorts of lovely trivia.

We travelled north along the North Thomson River valley and saw huge areas which had been burnt out  in a fire four years ago. It seemed to us that the native forests here have much more limited regenerative powers than our native bush at home, as they were still starkly bare. The vegetation and landscape had changed fairly dramatically from the semi-arid desert of the day before and we were seeing lots of swampy areas along the valley and we were back to lots of pines and beech trees on the higher ground, although we were constantly disappointed by the lack of birdlife and our inability to spot any moose, as these are the conditions they enjoy. We were also a bit sad about the fact that the smoke from the almost 300 fires now burning across northern British Columbia was obscuring all but the nearest highlands and mountains.

Travelling through the Caribou Mountains, the last of the Pacific Plate mountains before we reached the much younger Rocky Mountains, we passed by the beautiful Pyramid Falls.

As we waited in a siding for a freight train to pass, we learnt from Tim that freight trains can now be 200 carriages (or 2 miles) long and the longest he has seen was 216 carriages! No wonder they took so damn long to go by!!!!! We also found out why there are pairs of propane cylinders along the tracks. They are not for barbeques for passing train crews, but are linked electronically to 'central control' and are used to heat the points and switches in the winter - stuff you don''t even think about! Ignore the fact that this photo of a passing freight train was taken much earlier in the 'dry' country!

On we went, unable to see exciting things like the Albreda Glacier and Mt. Robson (highest point in the Canadian Rockies) because of the smoke and came to the Rocky Mountain Trench, where the two tectonic plates meet. Here we again ran alongside the Fraser River and discovered that the Chinook Salmon travel from the Pacific Ocean 800 miles to this area to spawn - how amazing is that? We were also amazed that we had seen the Fraser River here at its headwaters in Moose Lake and also where it enters the ocean at Vancouver.

As we crossed the Continental Divide at the highest point of our journey - about 3,200 feet (note how we have regressed to imperial measurements here in North America!), we left British Columbia and entered Alberta. We had expected that we would do a bit more climbing on this trip, but much of the journey was along river valleys (which makes perfect sense if you are a railway or roads' engineer), unlike our trip through the Sierra Nevada and Rocky Mountains on the Californian Zephyr, which reached heights of 9,000 feet and was, therefore, much more spectacular in many respects.
Arrived in Jasper at 6pm after a very enjoyable two days  - it is much more relaxing to travel long distances on a train than to drive, especially if you are being fed, watered and entertained and as a huge bonus, you get to meet lots of interesting people.

Our kind bed and breakfast host Ken came and picked us up from the station, so we settled ourselves into the Hummingbird Crossing B & B (what a great name!) and set off to explore Jasper, which sounds like a great place to spend the next two days.
The next part of our adventure, the Rocky Mountains, deserves its own blog entry so until next time . . .

Monday August 16th

Despite fears to the contrary, we are not lost (but thank you for your concerns Pat and Gordon)! We arrived back in Vancouver yesterday morning after seven very relaxing and enjoyable days on our inside passage cruise to Alaska, where we had limited internet access, hence the silence. But, first things first so I had better pick up from where we left off in Toronto.
The skies were clear for our flight to Vancouver and we got to have a good look at the Rockies as we passed over them. The sheer size of this mountain range is astounding, both in terms of height and spread, at least to those of us not used to large mountains. Kippers and Liette were waiting for us at the airport and after a couple of drinks at their apartment in English Bay we headed for the Japanese restaurant (one that Andy and Kim have fond memories of) across the road and as it was a beautiful evening we sat outside on the upstairs deck. A great start to our visit!

On Friday we caught the little ferry over to Granville Island which is
one of Vancouver's top tourist areas. The food market and shops are
 excellent and to add to the enjoyment there is an active boat industry
 interspersed amongst the shops. For the foodies we had a lunch of
various kinds of smoked salmon on the jetty!





Kippers and I enjoyed a swim down at English Bay later in the afteroon and Friday night saw us at another of Kipper's and Liette's favourite restaurants - we are doing it tough whichever way you look at it!

Saturday morning was spent getting ourselves organised for our 'cruise', which mostly consisted of trying to get some stuff out of our cases so we didn't have to cart it all with us and then Kippers drove us the short distance to the harbour where the 'Zuiderdam' was docked - what huge vessels these are. There were two cruise ships departing that afternoon, so that meant almost 4,000 people  milling about getting through security and customs and then on board. It all went 'swimmingly' however (we soon came to realise that such efficiency was necessary to organise so many people, especially as many of those  were very difficult to organise!) and we were safely on board and headed for the first of many meals by about 1.30pm. As novice cruise ship travellers, we were astounded by the size of the vessel and the furniture and fittings, which were, to our untrained eyes, somewhat over the top. Our stateroom, to which we repaired after lunch, was very pleasant - on the main deck, starboard side (are you impressed Gordon?) near the bow, with a large window which seemed amazingly close to the water.
Set sail at 5pm and started the journey up the Inside Passage towards Alaska. Very cloudy and foggy so we couldn't see a great deal beyond the shoreline, but very calm. Saturday night and Sunday were spent steaming up the coast and again the weather was not brilliant so we could not see much of the scenery of the mainland, Vancouver Island and Queen Charlotte Island as we sailed on past. Nevertheless, we managed to amuse ourselves very well in the lounge on the Observation Deck, with a few forays outside and met a few fellow travellers. Were also beginning to meet a few others over meals, some really interesting and some a little less so, but the number of people on the cruise (1,900 passengers and 800 crew) meant that we hardly ever saw any of them again unless we tried really hard to do so.

Monday morning saw us travelling up Tracey Arm, a beautiful fjord with towering mountains plunging straight down into waters 900 feet deep. Unfortunately cloud obscured a couple of hanging glaciers we passed, but we enjoyed all the little icebergs floating in the water, some of which were that beautiful blue of glacial ice. The ship turned at a strategic moment beyond which it would have been too narrow to do so and we headed for Juneau (the capital of Alaska and the only capital in Northern America with no road access), our northernmost and first port of call.  Spent the afternoon wandering there amongst the vast numbers of people from the four cruise ships docked that day.

Our arrival at Skagway the next morning. the starting point for most of those who were part of the Klondike gold rush back in the late1800's, was much earlier and we were on the deck ready for our train trip up to White Pass on the Yukon Route by 8.15am and what a journey it was! The railroad, built over 26 months between May 1898 and July 1900 is 110 miles long and climbs from sea level at Skagway to almost 3,000 feet at the summit near White Pass in just 20 miles. Because of the tight curves required, it had to be a narrow guage and 35,000 people were involved in its construction. The ride was fabulous, with amazing views down valleys, gorges and across those gorges to the track on the other side. Skagway was a very attractive little town and as many of the other tourists were off on tours etc, it wasn't too crowded. Again, there were four cruise ships docked and these huge vessels dominated the whole town.

So to Glacier Bay, a much-anticipated part of the journey, on Wednesday. The fog which had terrified us when we woke at 6am cleared to a beautiful sunny day as we entered Glacier Bay and we were treated to the most wondrous sights! The John Hopkins Glacier, a tidal glacier which comes right down to the sea and then the Margerite Glacier, which was even more impressive - ice 25 to 30 feet thick meeting the sea and with the snow-capped peaks and blue sky behind, it was stunning. We spent hours out on the deck rugged up in the coats, beanies etc enjoying every minute of this spectacular landscape. The ship stopped for about an hour in front of the glacier waiting to see if it would calve, but despite much cracking of ice all around, no such luck. Mind you, the weather we enjoyed here was all the luck we really needed!

Thursday was another superb day, so our views of Ketchikan, our last port of call, as we travelled up Tongass Narrows were enhanced by blue skies. I decided at this point that a flight up into the Misty Fjords National Park on a float plane was warranted, so I took off to do that while Heather combed Ketchikan checking out galleries and enjoying some beautiful Inuit artwork.

Parts of Ketchikan are built on pilings above the sea and the creek and the historic Creek Street area (Alaska's most notorious red-light district from 1902-54) was particularly atttractive. This was made even more special by the views we had of the thousands of salmon swimming upstream to spawn. My feelings of jealousy and awe were further fuelled by the sight of people fishing from the seaward side of the creek (quite acceptable it transpired).


Before we left Ketchiksan Heff managed to fulfil her dream of bringing home a special piece of local artwork - something for us to show you all when we get it and us home.
Once the ship left Ketchikan, it was full speed ahead for Vancouver. Friday was spent up on deck in the sunshine, enjoying the fabulous views along the Inside Passage we had missed in the fog on the way up. It is so impressive.

Kippers picked us up from the ship at 7.30am and once we had dropped our stuff off at the apartment we headed off to nearby Grouse Mountain. Another beautiful day of sight seeing - snow-capped mountains, blue skies, bears (two orphaned grizzly cubs which live on the mountain), more mountains and on and on it went! We couldn't ask for better weather and unlike Toronto, it has not been humid. Now the weather has cleared we can truly appreciate the views across English Bay from Kippers and Liette's apartment too.

Sunday was spent at Whistler, which involved a two hour cliff-side trip, involving coastal scenery and views across snow-capped mountain ranges which were just breathtaking. Our time up on Whistler, including a trip on the Peak2Peak gondola ride, from Whistler across to Blackcomb Mountain, was astounding ). This gondola lift boasts the world's longest free span (3.03 km) between ropeway towers and the highest point above the ground (436 metres).

Heff was not convinced that this was a sensible way to be spending an afternoon at all, but she did overcome all (or most) of her reservations and join us in the cabin (facing backwards to avoid any visual evidence of our height above the ground!). We even saw a bear cub ambling along one of the access tracks from the Village Gondola - hope its mum didn't take a fancy to one of the many mountain bikers tearing down the mountain! We were most impressed with the way in which Kippers and Liette had arranged such stunning weather for our trip and would recommend them as tour guides.

Today (Monday) has also been another beautiful day and Heff and I have been down to the Australian Consulate to vote and have visted Gastown and the beautiful marina area at Coal Harbour, where we once again drooled over the boats which were for sale and how incredibly cheap they are here. Anyone interested in setting up a consortium to buy a gorgeous old Monk or Grand Banks wooden hulled boat? A season exploring the Inside Passage and then we somehow bring it home - bliss!!!


Whew - we have finally brought you all up to date with our goings on. Tomorrow morning Kippers will drop us at the station nice and early so we can board the Rocky Mountaineer train for our two day trip up to Jasper in the Rocky Mountains, so stay tuned for more adventures once we get some reliable internet access!!!!!!

Thursday August 5th

As unbelievable as it is, we have almost finished our time here in Toronto, so before we head west to Vancouver this afternoon, we will give a quick outline of our activities here since arriving from New York last Thursday.
It has, of course been wonderful to again spend time with Kate and Derek and to take advantage of their very pleasant apartment to catch up with boring things like washing! The weather has continued to be fantastic, maybe a little too humid at times for Heff, but perfect for those of us with a touch of lizard. It is certainly a far cry from the weather Murray experienced here during his visit in January.

Kate and I last week decided that given our limited opportunities to stumble across a Polar Bear, Reindeer or Arctic Wolf in the areas we will all be visiting on our respective trips around Canada and further, given our very limited sightings of moose and grizzly bears (just as well probably!)to date, a trip to the Toronto Zoo was warranted. We were of the view that seeing in them in this environment was better than not seeing them at all. The three polar bears at the Zoo are all rescued, orphaned cubs so we did our best to ease our consciences about the ethics of zoos and headed off with Derek and Murray for what turned out to be a very long trip to the Zoo via subway, train and bus. The Polar Bears and Grizzly Bears were truly beautiful animals and we were lucky enough to watch the Polar Bears swimming from the underwater observation area and what superbly graceful animals they are in the water. We did, of course, take loads of photos, so here are a couple of our favourites. As you can see, Kate and Derek also watched one of the Grizzlies playing in the water:

Murray and I continued exploring parts of Toronto we had not yet visited, such as The Beaches, an area east of the city which has an extensive beach area along the shores of Lake Ontario. Given that the weather continues to be very hot here in Toronto, it is understandably popular, although for those of us who have been spoilt by the beautiful beaches we have access to at home, the water looked less than inviting. In fact when Murray headed off with the swimmers, Kate told him "I wouldn't swim in Lake Ontario!"
The highlight of our time back here though has been a two day trip Kate, Murray and I took up to The 1000 Islands (Derek had to work so he could not join us) on Monday and Tuesday.We hired a car and drove the 270kms to a little town called Gananoque, from which we took a two and a half hour boat cruise around the islands. There are really about 1,800 islands despite the name, located in the St Lawrence River (or Seaway as it is called in some parts as large, ocean-going ships are able to negotiate parts) between Kingston and Brockville. It is an amazing area, with many of the islands (some of which are very small) being privately owned and having incredible holiday homes and boathouses built on them. The US/Canadian border runs along the St. Lawrence at this point, so the islands are shared about 50:50 between the two countries.

 

One of the most amazing 'homes' is Boldt Castle, a full size Rhineland castle with its own incredible boathouse, built on Heart Island by George C. Boldt, millionaire owner of the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York as a display of love for his wife Louise. Construction began in 1900, but was sadly brought to a halt by Boldt when Louise died suddenly in 1904. He never returned to the island and the castle is now owned by the Thousand Island Bridge Authority.

This would be a magical area to explore over a week or two on your own boat. Dreams! Dreams! Dreams!








So now we are about to fly away to the other side of Canada. We are, of course, very sad to be leaving Kate and Derek, but they have some exciting trips coming up, so the timing is perfect. Kate's best friend Claire arrived last night from Australia and they are off to New York for a few days next week, before meeting up with Derek in San Francisco for some adventures on the US west coast. We will look forward to seeing Kate and Derek back home at the end of the year, by which time we will all have seen and experienced many more wonderful places. Enjoyed our last night together at a lovely French restaurant close to where Derek and Kate live and we managed to eat one of the native animals (elk tenderloins, which were very tasty indeed and brought Murray a little closer to his desire to eat a moose!)