From Wolf Den I drove through Wyoming for a while, before crossing briefly into Idaho, through hills which were quite barren, then along the edge of Bear Lake in Utah, which was pretty large – I could see the hills on the other side quite a distance away. I stopped in Bear Lake State Park Marina, off the main highway in a town called Garden City, and found they wanted payment to enter the park. The area was unstaffed, but unlike some other states, rather than wanting you to put cash in an envelope, they had an electronic payment system, so I could get a pass that way. I think this was one of the several places I noticed where they had tyre spikes to stop people coming in the exit. You could drive out with no problem, but woe betide your tyres if you drove in that way!

There was a large parking lot and a marina, and a bit of a beach along the lake nearby. I walked around for a little while, admiring the yellow flowers growing by the water, and noticing the hills behind the lake, which had copses of red trees along them. I’m not sure what they were, but they were very colourful, and I don’t think I ever saw them up close, but there were a lot of them here and there in that area. It was a partly cloudy day, and a pretty area.

I was running low on supplies, so I visited a “market” in the town – what the US seems to call small independent supermarkets, and got more tins for dinner, and lunch meat and other groceries. The town was supposed to be famous for its raspberry shakes, and I’d read an article discussing the pros and cons of the different spots. Well, there were plenty of signs advertising them, but from what I could see, each and every place that was advertising them was closed! I tried a few, and nothing was open. I guess they operated only during the school holiday season.

While planning, I’d found that near my route was a rather strange named park called Unita-Wasatch-Cache National Forest, which sounded quite nice, and not a big detour to go through it, so I drove off in that direction. I hadn’t realised that this was actually quite high up! After driving through some flat country, with mountains in the distance, entering Wyoming again, then back to Utah, the road started to climb up into them.

There were signs saying you needed to pay to park there, and I wasn’t sure if my US National Parks pass would cover it. I pulled over into an information bay to see if I could find out anything about that, and met another man there. He thought that my pass would be ok, and I had suspected that too, since it was a national forest, and I proceeded on. I passed an area with beautiful yellow grasses near a place called Sulphur Campground, and kept on to Mirror Lake.

Just before the lake, I stopped by a little heart-shaped lake called Butterfly Lake, with beautiful reflections. The area was at around 10,000 feet, and the van was working really hard to get up the steep gradients to get there. It probably didn’t help that it had lower than usual octane petrol in it.

In most of the US, the normal unleaded was sold as 87 octane (which is like our 91 apparently, they measure it differently), but places in Utah were selling 85 octane as their standard petrol. Apparently some places at higher altitudes did that, because you could get away with lower octane petrol when higher up. Also most petrol in the US was mixed with ethanol, and some places sold non-ethanol fuel at a premium.

After a while I got up to the lake, which wasn’t mirror-like at all, because there was a bit of a wind blowing, but it was a pretty spot. I parked and put my America the Beautiful parks pass card on the dash, and made some lunch. I found a bench near the lake, and ate there. There were bits of sun coming and going, with dark clouds around.

The weather was changing constantly at that altitude. I went for a little walk along the lake, admiring more of the yellow grasses, then drove up a little higher to a vantage point looking out over the lake and mountains beyond. There was quite a lot of forest around, I think pine trees, but about half of the trees were dead. Perhaps that was because the weather got quite fierce at that altitude. I could see drifts of rain coming and going across the mountains.

The road climbed steeply through some switchbacks, and I found myself at Bald Mountain Pass, about 10,700 feet (3,260m), apparently the highest paved road in Utah. I stopped to look at the view, then continued on down the other side of the mountain. On the way down I visited the pretty Upper Provo Falls, then as I got lower, I started seeing the hillsides covered with the red trees again, a spectacular sight, but I was struggling to find anywhere to pull off the road to take a photo.

A couple of kilometres before Kamas I saw a lovely scene with the red hills and some farm houses in the foreground, and pulled into a driveway to take a photo. Wouldn’t the occupant of the house be coming out just then! He pulled alongside me and asked me something along the lines of if he could help me. I explained that I was just pulling in to take a photo and asked if that was ok, and he said yes. Then he was having a bit of trouble getting out of the driveway with me there, so he asked me if I’d pull forward a bit. It was a rather steep driveway and I was a bit concerned I wouldn’t be able to back out again, but I went a bit further down, then got the photos I wanted.

I managed to get out again and back onto the main road, not so easy with all the traffic coming and going. From there I went through the towns of Kamas and Francis, approaching the Jordanelle Reservoir, which was pretty large, and quite a dramatic sight with flowers in the foreground, and dark mountains behind. I could see ski runs on the mountains (though without snow at that time of year), so it must have been quite high still.

There was an overlook a bit further along where I could see the whole reservoir, and a four-lane highway in the distance, which I was to join shortly. Somewhere along here Google took me along a small, low speed limit side road to avoid traffic, but I eventually ended up on the highway, which went along to Deer Creek Reservoir, where I stopped at a state park to have a quick look around, with more hills in the background dotted with patches of red trees.

I’d read about Bridal Veil Falls being quite pretty, just off the highway a bit further along. I turned off onto a small road off the highway, and parked near the falls, which had a couple of levels of waterfall which did look rather like a bridal veil. I walked along a track next to the falls for a little way. I was not enthusiastic about Google's choice of having me turn left across four lanes of fast moving traffic to get back onto the highway, with no obvious place to stop in the middle. This was a bit tricky in a not very nimble campervan, but I managed to get across after a while thank the Lord.

The highway went into the city of Provo, a fairly large place, where I joined with the Interstate I-15, with some very interesting driving indeed. Usually when an Interstate went through a major city, they would lower the speed limit to maybe 55mph (88km/h) where there were a lot of entries and exits, but here the speed limit was 70mph (112km/h), four or five lanes each way, with lanes coming and going for different exits, cars changing lanes continuously, and I wasn’t the slowest vehicle, so I was in one of the middle lanes.

Usually I was one of the slowest vehicles, keeping the speed limit, which most people didn’t, and it was fairly easy just driving in the right lane and passing trucks every so often, but there was more to look out for in the middle lanes. It sometimes felt a little vulnerable venturing out into the middle lanes, when there was fast traffic. People were also zooming by at different speeds, and some were going slowly, and I had to continuously look in the mirrors at the lanes either side so I knew whether I could change lanes to pass someone, and not be run down by a fast person zooming up. It was pretty exacting, I had to concentrate hard, and was glad when I was through that bit!

The Interstate continued on to Las Vegas eventually, but I turned off to go towards the RV park where I’d booked in, at the rather strangely named town of Helper. I wound through hills, with a train line next to the road, and it was getting toward 7 as I started to enter some interesting looking canyon-like territory, and arrived at Blue Cut RV park after a bit more driving. This was off the main highway, though there was a rather main looking road running near it, and also the train line wasn’t far away, but the trains didn’t seem to run very often, I think I heard only one or two, and there wasn’t a lot of traffic on the road. There didn't seem to be any RV parks in the area that weren't near the train line. Opposite the park was an impressive rock face. At night it looked as thought maybe it was lit up somehow.

I had spoken to the owner when I booked, a few months back, and she was very friendly. I contacted her on the day to make sure it was ok to arrive lateish, and she was fine with that, and said to message her when I got there so she knew I’d arrived ok, which was nice. I was to pay cash in an envelope, $40, and post it in a slot. There were free showers as I recall, and a little stream running alongside the grounds. Some of the commercial RV parks had quite nice facilities, almost like a normal bathroom, with a shower, toilet and washbasin. The state and national campgrounds were a bit varied, some had large communal rooms, sometimes with shower cubicles that had curtains you could pull, and other places had individual rooms each with a toilet and washbasin – especially the ones that had unisex toilets.

After having the temperature below or around freezing the previous few nights, it was around 9 degrees at night there, which felt quite warm! The campground was around 5,500 feet (1,675m) I think, which was still quite high, but I think I was able to dispense with my sleeping bag as a doona that night. It had been a big day of very varied scenery, plains, lakes, mountains and canyons!

Image Gallery

In the morning, I set off early to give the Old Faithful geyser one more try before visiting Grand Teton National Park. My route took me back through Grand Prismatic Springs.

The rivers were spectacular in the early morning, with mist coming off them. They were probably quite warm. I didn’t visit the springs again, but got some great photos of the steam coming off them in the early morning as I went through.

I got to Old Faithful a bit before 8, and wouldn’t you know it, I just missed it again. I had found out you could check online when they expected the next eruption, but I had no phone service, so couldn’t check. Old Faithful didn't seem very faithful – it wasn’t meant to be apparently.

Back through West Thumb I went, then off to the south this time, to Jackson Lake, which was a beautiful sight with hills and mountains in the background, and more autumn colours in the foreground, especially yellow grasses and bushes. One of the amazing things about autumn colours in North America is that everything changes colour, not just the trees, but grass and bushes too.

I stopped again near Willow Flats, admiring the colours with the mountains behind. There were two roads that went through Grand Teton, one the main highway, and the other a smaller, more scenic route. They both started and ended at the same place, but took different routes between.

I had decided to have a look a little way down the main highway one way, then double back to the scenic route, then go back up the main highway from the southern end, about half an hour, to some scenic spots there. So my northern destination on the highway was a place called Oxbow Bend, on the Snake River, which I think is quite long, and goes through several states. It was an amazingly beautiful place, with a good sized lake, which was very still. There were more lovely red and yellow autumn colours in front, and then the mountains reflected in the lake. It was one of the most scenic places I’d been, and I spent quite a while enjoying it and taking lots of photos. There weren’t too many people there.

From there I drove back to the main entrance to the park on the scenic route. The mountains were very impressive along the route. I had planned to drive up Signal Mountain if I could. When I’d booked the 18’ campervan, I’d found something on the website about RVs not being allowed, and I emailed the park people asking if I could take the van up there. A nice lady replied, saying it was a bit of grey area with that size, and I think she said there had been a 19’ van made it up, so I could be ok. It seems that there were sharp switchbacks. With the 20’ van I’d been upgraded to, I decided it would probably be a bad idea to try.

I turned off along the Jenny Lake Scenic Drive, to get to to String Lake, where I’d planned a hike. I found a park, and set off. The hike was scenic indeed, with reflections of the high mountains, with some autumn foliage at the bottom of them, in the distance. I hiked up from String Lake to the larger Leigh Lake, then back, probably less than an hour. I followed the scenic drive further along – it was one way, and had to pass by one of the beautiful overlooks, because the car park was full. I’d wanted to have lunch at Jenny Lake. Well, that was a nice idea, but not only was the car park full, there were cars parked along the road for maybe 1km! I think it was the longest stretch of road parking I’d ever seen!

I wasn’t about to walk back 1km to see it, so I drove on a bit further and found another picnic area, with parking available. There was someone who had set up a camera on a big tripod next to a table, but it was otherwise unoccupied. It looked like the only free table, and I asked if he minded if I used it, and he was ok with that. I had a beautiful view of the mountains as I ate my sandwich.

After lunch I took the Taggart Lake Loop hike for about an hour and a half, up into the mountains a bit, which was also lovely, with more foliage, and a lake with mountain reflections.

Afterwards I thought I would give Jenny Lake another try. This time the car park still looked full, but parking was available on the road, not far from the car park, so I parked and walked down there. It was a very pretty spot, with the high mountains looming right behind it. There were light showers coming and going, with a bit of sun, which made for some beautiful light effects on the mountains. I stopped on the shore for a while and admired the view. There was a ferry running regularly across the lake for hikers to start hikes on the other side. I had been originally planning to take one of the hikes, but it was getting later in the day now, and I didn’t think I would have time.

I took a walk along the shores of the lake instead. There were picturesque steps going up a small hill next to the lake, with birches changing colour, and also colourful undergrowth. It was lovely to walk along the lake and admire the views.

From there I headed out of the park, joining the main highway again at a small town rather quaintly named Moose. I drove north up the highway to see a couple of viewpoints from that side. There was an overlook of the chain of mountains off into the distance, with sun rays shining on them. I wanted to see Schwabacher Landing. There was a quite badly maintained dirt road going down to it, and with some trepidation I manoeuvred the van down it.

I was rewarded with an amazing sight – everything seemed to be yellow! Yellow bushes, yellow grasses, yellow trees, next to a stream. The sun shone on it at times, and it looked spectacular with the dark mountains in the background. I spent a while there. I had planned to go a bit further, but time was starting to get on a bit, and I still had a couple of hours of driving from there to get to my RV park.

The route took me through Jackson, a fair sized town, and along the Snake River again. I stopped on the side of the road after a while, just before the small town of Alpine, to look down at the river, which seemed to have green water! I was seeing more and more autumn colour. There was a stand of trees along the river with yellows and oranges and reds, so beautiful! The road led down into fairly flat country, with houses and businesses here and there, and mountains in the far distance. Wolf Den RV Park came up a bit after 7, still in Wyoming, near the border with Idaho. I checked in – someone was still there at what I think was a store as well as the office.

The RV park wasn’t far from the main road, and was fairly open. I think there were mainly cabins, but a few spots for RVs, just parked next to one another without much privacy, but I was only there for the night. I cooked my dinner, and ate it with some views of the mountains in the distance. At the front of the campground was the front of a kind of stylised wild west street – just the front of a few buildings like a bank and saloon, with models of a couple of people, one an Indian in traditional dress. I admired a nice sunset before heading to bed. Sunset was getting earlier as I headed south and east, and the season was getting later, and was around 7.30pm by that time.

Image Gallery

I left the campground fairly early to drive an hour or so to First Baptist Church in West Yellowstone, having a quick look at one of the nearby canyon waterfalls on the way. It was another beautiful day. Coming out of the park, I could see long lines of people waiting to get in. It looked as though getting there at midday on Saturday had saved me a lot of waiting. The church was a pretty one, with a white spire. The congregation were very friendly and affectionate, as friendly as any I’d met. They invited guests to introduce themselves during the early part of the service.

The pastor was quite old, with a long white beard, and sat on a chair to preach as I recall. He preached a good sermon. Afterwards, I talked with some of the congregation. A group of people were going to eat at a restaurant they went to every Sunday at lunchtime, and invited me. I went and ate with them, and finally had a buffalo burger, which I had been wanting to try for a while.

It was nice, though I didn’t think it tasted much different from a normal burger. After the meal, the waitress took everyone's credit cards off and processed them, then came back with the credit cards and paper receipts. We had to calculate a tip and write it on the receipt and leave it there. I was a bit concerned I would miscalculate and give too small a tip!

From there I drove back into the park, to do the lower loop. It was quick to get into the park again in the middle of the day. There were two huge loop roads, and I had done the upper loop the previous day. My route went back through Madison, so I checked into the campground as I went by. This was a much smaller affair than the Canyon one, with less facilities. It was nice though, with quite a lot of trees growing through it. There were a couple of people ahead of me, but I got checked in, and found my spot.

I kept going, back through Canyon, and I had a quick look at the falls and canyon in brighter light. From there I started the lower loop, the first destination being Yellowstone Lake. On the way I was able to spot some bison feeding in the distance.

It was a large lake, and a lovely sight in the sunshine. The road went around the edge of it for some time, before coming to West Thumb. There was an area there with more colourful steaming pools, right on the shore of the lake. There were even a few of what looked like rock pools, right in the shallow water of the lake itself, with water boiling the whole time.

Crossing the Continental Divide, the road peaked again at about 8,300 feet on the way to the famous Old Faithful geyser. There was an overpass off the road, and a huge parking lot. Clearly a lot of cars sometimes came this way! The car park wasn’t too crowded, and I was trying to find out how to actually get to the geyser itself. I found out to my sorrow that I had just missed an eruption. I just saw the tail end, as a small geyser was slowly dissipating. They were able to predict approximately when the next one would be, and it was just on sunset. I debated whether to stay around for it, but it would have involved driving back in the dusk or dark, which people had recommended against due to the risk of hitting wandering animals.

I did a bit of a walk around the area around the geyser, looking at some of the other smaller features. It was pretty in the late light, with steam coming from a lot of places. The Old Faithful Lodge, next to the main geyser, was a large wooden building, with an impressive fireplace inside, and a cafeteria and shops, some of which were closed at that hour.

Reluctantly I left, to head to the campground at Madison before dark. Along the way, I came on Grand Prismatic Springs. I’m not sure I had realised this was there, and had I known, I would have left Old Faithful a bit earlier. From a distance I could see a large amount of steam rising, lit by the last of the sunlight, and there was a steaming stream running into the river that went through there. It was an amazing place, with walkways over large expanses of shallow steaming water, some of it very colourful. The colours weren’t as striking near sunset, but it was amazing to see the sunset reflecting on the water, with the steam everywhere.

On the way to Madison, the car ahead of me slowed right down, and I did too, and there was a huge bison, right next to the road! I got to the campground safely, and made some dinner.

Image Gallery

I set off early for the five hour or so drive to West Yellowstone. The landscape soon became more open, with rolling hills, and some nice views here and there.

I stopped by Nevada Lake, a small lake which caught my eye because there were waves of mist rolling along it. After a while I got onto I-90, with its 80mph speed limit, which was nice, even if Google had taken me on the smallest of dirt roads for a little way to get there from another highway. Unlike the case with other highways, I wasn’t amongst the slowest vehicles on the road on 80mph highways – I was actually passing other cars sometimes. There wasn’t much traffic, and it was a nice drive.

Nearing Yellowstone I briefly stopped at Ennis, which was done up a bit to look like a frontier town. From West Yellowstone I drove to the park entrance, right on the edge of town, around 12. There weren’t a lot of people heading into the park at that time of day, so I got through the line up fairly quickly, and started driving through the park, looking for a place to have lunch. West Yellowstone is in Montana, but most of the park is in Wyoming, so I crossed over the border quite soon after entering the park.

I settled on a lunch spot at a turn-out next to the pretty Madison River which ran through the park. I had the spot to myself, and made my customary sandwich and ate it with the river view.

A bit further along was Gibbon Falls, a pretty waterfall with quite a lot of people around, and it was a bit tricky getting parking. Further along I went through Madison, which was marked on the map, but which seemed to be just basically a campground – the one where I was to stay the following night. Some parts of the park were quite populated, but other parts were quieter.

From there I arrived at Norris Geyser Basin, which has a lot of pools with thermal activity. There were loads of people there, and the car parks were full, so I had to park along the road, and walk along a track they’d set up to get there, for about 10 minutes or so. There were officials directing traffic.

As well as the pools, the place also had areas with steam coming out of them. They all smelt of sulphur, which was not very pleasant, and the trees weren’t too happy with it either. You could see a lot of dead trees around some of them. I listened to a park ranger talking about the area for a while. Apparently sometimes a pool would go dormant and trees would grow around it, then after many years it would start emitting sulphur gasses again and the trees would die.

There was a large flat area with wooden walkways along it, and more pools of interesting colours, and gasses being emitted, but the star of the show was definitely a geyser (if that’s the right way to describe it) that had kind of a moist steamy spurt pouring out of it continuously, well up into the sky. It was sunny, and the steam was making rainbows all around, which was beautiful. I took lots of photos of it. There was a walkway that went close by it, and you could get a bit wet when the wind blew it in that direction as you walked by.

From there I headed to Mammoth Hot Springs. This was less impressive but still pretty, with boardwalks to see more of the thermal activity. There was a loop you could drive on, but it said no RVs, so I gave it a miss. You could park down below and walk up though, and I had a look at some of it by foot. I guess people used to bathe in the hot springs at some point, but it didn’t look like they did now. There was a small town nearby, with shops, and I think even a church.

The road wound through pretty territory after this, with hills, a lake or two, and grasses that were starting to go yellow and orange for autumn.

Tower Fall was next on the drive, an impressive waterfall – narrow, but with a long drop. You couldn’t get very close to it. There was a general store at the parking lot there, and a nice view of the canyon the river ran through a little further along.

The road got quite high as I continued on, and there were lovely views over tree-covered hills, as I got into Canyon and checked into the campground. It was a short drive from the campground to some of the sights at at what they called the Grand Canyon of Yosemite.

It lived up to its name. It was very deep, and also long apparently, and quite colourful. There were two powerful waterfalls which were impressive to see. I was there towards sunset, and there weren’t many people around, which was great. I walked down a steep path to see a close-up view of one of the waterfalls, which was majestic, with spray coming up continuously from where it was landing. I think the area was at around 8,000 feet, and I felt it while walking back up to the top!

The campground was quite large, and had free showers! It was a bit of a walk from my site to the shower block, but it was great to just enjoy the shower while not being concerned about whether the time would run out. I think the showers closed not too long after I got in, and so I went and had a shower before I got dinner. It was one of the better facilities from the campgrounds I’d been to. This was actually the last night they were open, then they were closing for the season.

It was a chilly night, just below freezing again I think, but I was pretty warm in the van. There had been reports that there was no phone reception in most of the park, but when I was there someone said you’re out of luck unless you’re with Verizon. I noticed my phone had roamed onto that network, and I did have coverage some of the time, including while I was in this campground, which was handy for messaging people and posting the (mostly) daily updates with photos on Instagram and Facebook for people to follow along.

Image Gallery

I was back on the road again after a lovely, if short stay, looking forward to seeing my aunt Heather again for a longer time in a couple of months on my way back home. I drove out of town, before sunrise, heading for Montana.

There was a pretty sunrise, and I was driving into the sun for a while, then turned south through the fairly flat land characteristic of Alberta, with rolling hills, looking fairly dry. Mountains loomed very slowly in the distance, and in a bit under three hours I was at the US border. This was a very quiet crossing, as I had hoped it would be. There were no line ups at all, I was the only car around, and I had a nice chat with the man there. I think he may have asked me if I had any fresh fruit or veggies, which I didn’t, and the usual things about cannabis, weapons and cigarettes.

Off into the US I went, and stopped not far over the border at a general store in a very small town called Babb, to get some fresh fruit and veggies, bread and cheese. Just out of the town was a lovely view of Lower Saint Mary Lake, where I pulled over to have a look. Another half hour and I was in Glacier National Park, on the famous Going-to-the-Sun road. Before Saint Mary Lake was a pretty river, which joined it with the Lower Saint Mary Lake, where I stopped briefly, before going on to Saint Mary Lake itself, so beautiful in the sunshine, with large mountains behind it.

The road followed the lake for some time, and I stopped at Sun Point and other spots to take photos, then walked to Baring Falls, which was pretty. The walk to it along the lake was more impressive though! There were great views over the lake near the start of the trail, and I spent a while around there.

There had been relatively little traffic when I started on the Going-to-the-Sun road, but it got increasingly crowded as I went up the hill from the lake. I managed to get a spot to look at a view and waterfall, then further up, every spot where a car could fit was occupied, as we got close to the Logan Pass, which was the highest point.

I was treated to amazing views but couldn’t stop, which was disappointing. For about 2km either side of the pass, there was absolutely nowhere to stop, with cars jammed in everywhere, and a line up for parking at the visitor centre at the top. About 2km down from the summit I found somewhere I could pull off the road, which had a beautiful view of the other side, and I made lunch, and had it there. I contemplated hiking back up again, but it was a steep grade, quite a distance, and along the main road, and I think there was nowhere really to safely walk along the side of the road.

Parking wasn’t so bad as I got further from the summit again, but the road was very busy, lots of cars coming and going, and it was also very narrow, with a rock face on one side, and a rock wall on the other. I was rather nervous about scraping the side of the van! The lookouts were mostly on the other side of the road, so I had to pull across the traffic in and out each time. The views were amazing though, down through a huge valley, with some autumn foliage scattered around.

There were old-fashioned “charabanc” type open minibuses coming and going, with a number of doors on each side. These were apparently renovated versions of the buses that had been purchased in the 30s. They were beautifully polished and painted convertibles, providing a bus service for people who didn’t want to drive the road.

   I stopped off at a couple of places on the way down to Red Rock point, which was a river which had glacier-coloured water, and red rocks, which made for a colourful combination!

There were roadworks for a long way after that, with the road unsealed, before I ended up at Lake McDonald, another beautiful lake with mountains in the background. A short drive from there deposited me in the town of West Glacier. After a while the road headed out into beautiful countryside, with lakes and forests. Montana, unlike some other states, had 70mph (112km/h) rural roads, and as I was to find out, 80mph (128km/h) interstate highways. This was nice!

It was about two and a half hours drive from West Glacier to my campground at Salmon Lake. I stopped for some photos at Swan Lake, then drove through more forest and by more lakes to Salmon Lake. There were roadworks along a decent stretch of road by the lake and campground which slowed things down, but I got there about 7ish and settled in.

The campground was right on the lake, which though small by the standards of what I had seen, was still pretty big, and a lovely spot. It was near sunset, and I got some nice photos of the reflections of the forest and hills on the still lake, and some cabins on the far shore. It would have been a great spot to have a cabin!

I had a nice chat with a couple camping nearby, then after making dinner, settled in for the night.

Image Gallery

The van was ready in the morning, so I picked it up, thankful to the Lord that everything had disrupted the trip so little. I got all the receipts for the expenses and sent them off to the van hire company. We were running out of places to see, but Heather thought of Aspen Crossing, which was not too far away, and she prepared another picnic lunch and we headed over there.

It was an interesting place, with a couple of trains parked on tracks, and a restaurant in one of the carriages. The tracks went on for a while, and apparently they ran the trains sometimes. There was also a store, and Heather found she knew someone who worked there, We tucked into our lunch at a table outside the shop. It was so sunny and pleasant. I wasn’t sure whether sunscreen was needed, but Heather said it was just during the summer months, and there was no need by now. This was definitely different from back at home!

We walked by the trains, and looked at an old police car, which was perhaps from the 50s, not in good shape, but interesting to see. We took a leisurely walk around some gardens surrounding campsites that had been set up there. From there we had a quick look at Mcgregor Lake, which was a nice spot, though surrounded by fairly dry country, and I had been spoiled by mountain lakes with snow capped mountains!

After we got home, I joined in the regular Bible study Heather and her friend had every week, and later on spent some time sorting out issues with moving my website due to my hosting provider getting out of the business. The were planning to shut down things before I got back, so I had to get it sorted while I was away.

Image Gallery

While I was with Heather I think I got a start on migrating my website to my own hosting. My hosting company had said they were quitting hosting, and given us till Oct 31st to move the website to alternate hosting, which was while I was still on holidays. There was an alternative company taking over, but I had decided to host it myself, I think I didn’t entirely like the look of the other company. We found out that the main issue with the van had been fixed – the coolant reservoir, they were just waiting on the wipers. This was very encouraging!

We had a fairly leisurely morning, with a nice breakfast, and Heather made a picnic lunch for the day. We found out that the main issue with the van had been fixed – the coolant reservoir, they were just waiting on the wipers. This was very encouraging!

There was a place called the Badlands, which Heather wanted me to see, about an hour and three quarters drive east. She drove her car there, and we arrived about 2.15pm, in a park called Dinosaur Provincial Park. Getting to the first lookout, I was greeted with a huge canyon, not as deep as Grand Canyon, but with that feeling to it. It was filled with a lot of large domed, weathered hills with colourful tops. Apparently it was called the Badlands because there was little vegetation and water, and few animals.

After looking from the top, we drove down into the canyon itself. A river was running to one side of it, with the start of some autumn colour. We found the visitor centre, and sat outside on another beautiful sunny day, to eat our lunch. Heather had packed a great lunch, with sandwiches, salad, fruit salad, and I think a bunch of other things. It was quite elaborate, and went down well. We were quite late eating.

Once we’d finished lunch, I had a bit of a walk around some of these humpy hills, seeing them up close from the bottom. There were some stairs and walkways to help navigate them. It was easy to get lost in the maze of these hills – they were really smaller than hills, almost just large mounds. I got a bit disoriented, and climbed to the top of one to see where I needed to go.

From there we went to have a look at the river, apparently the Red Deer River. It was quite wide, and fairly still, with some reflections of a few more hills on the other side, and a boat ramp, where a family seemed to be packing up some small boats, maybe kayaks, that they had presumably been on the river with.

It was nice to see some lovely yellow foliage on a few of the trees. Some of the others hadn’t started turning yet. I was still looking for good autumn colours, it was a bit early in most places still, and I think the colours were late that year, from the warm dry weather.

Image Gallery

This was a bit of an errands day. I ran a load of washing through and took the perishables out of the fridge. I wasn’t planning to bring them back into the US, and also I wasn’t sure how long the fridge would run for while I wasn’t driving the van. Someone suggested only 12 hours, but it had run for a couple of days at Yosemite without any apparent trouble, and it seemed to be going the whole time while I was here.

I dropped the van off at the mechanic near my aunt's house, for an oil change, to change the wipers if they needed it (they were a bit of a menace, hardly wiping the windscreen at all, which made driving in the rain challenging!), and of course to replace the leaking coolant reservoir. Heather got us some lunch, and we visited the Walmart in nearby Strathmore, which was quite a decent sized town. I needed a new pair of shoes, and found some Dr. Scholls shoes which seemed to be a good fit, and weren’t very expensive.

Late in the afternoon we visited Wyndham-Carseland Provincial Park, on the Bow River. There was a weir there, with quite a decent flow over it, and big warning signs calling it a drowning machine. According to the signs, if you got under that flow, the water was rotating in a kind of cylinder all along the bottom of the weir, and it was next to impossible to get up for air again if you ended up there. Presumably one or more people found that out the hard way.

We checked out the view from an area high above the river, I think it may have been Warden’s Point, looking across the river, and into the flat area beyond. A lot of the area was quite dry and treeless, though there was quite a strip of trees along the river in places, and the start of some autumn colour.

I usually sleep with a lot of blankets and wondered if I would need more blankets there when the nights got a bit chilly, but I didn’t count on the central heating a lot of houses had, including my aunt's, which kept things at a nice temperature, even at night. There was a big gas heater in the basement, and grills in the floor for the heat to come up.

Image Gallery

I got up early to get to Lake Louise. Parking at the lake was almost impossible to get apparently. A friend had got there at 3.30am to make sure of getting a spot, and slept in the car. So I had booked a shuttle bus well in advance (spaces on these sold out also), for a time between 8 and 9am.

I checked out of the RV park and made the drive back up the highway again, which was starting to get familiar. This time I turned off to the Lake Louise Ski Resort, where the shuttle bus left. There were immense parking lots, only a fraction of which were filled at that time of the morning. I found my way to the information kiosk, and was sent off to where the bus left.

The buses left every 15 minutes I think, and it seems I had just missed the 8am one. There were just a couple of other people waiting when I got there. Eventually the bus came, and we headed off to the lake, getting there around 8.45, and already there were large crowds of people around. I saw the famous Lake Louise Hotel as I took the few minutes walk to the lake itself.

It was partly cloudy, and the sun was starting to shine on the mountains surrounding the lake, which was another striking blue-green shade. With the snow-capped mountains as a backdrop and mirror-like reflections, it was an amazing sight. Despite the crowds, I was able to get photos without people in them.

My plan was to do a four-hour round trip hike, up to a summit called the Big Beehive. I thought this would thin out the crowds, and it did to an extent, but there were still a lot of people doing this hike. I had discovered a few days before, that one of the reasons I was still having trouble with my feet, after the Half Dome hike, was that the soles on my sneakers were nearly worn out, so there wasn’t a lot of padding.

I had got them only about a month before, so I wasn’t expecting that. I had been doing a lot of hiking though. So I had been wearing my bigger hiking boots instead. But I discovered during this hike that with thin socks (it was a warm day), they rubbed painfully against one of my ankles after a while. There wasn’t much I could do about that at this point though.

Part way up the hike, after some significant climbing, was Lake Agnes, a long and fairly narrow lake, with the famous Lake Agnes Tea House at one end, and a waterfall coming from it. Apparently everything they sell there, and all supplies, have to be hiked in, or come in on mules. There was a line up to be served, and I had no desire to waste time waiting in line. I had brought my lunch to avoid having to do this. So onward I went. The trail I wanted went along the side of Lake Agnes, but I didn’t. I found after a little while I had mistakenly taken another trail, which was going up fairly steeply. It was a shame to give up that hard-earned altitude, and go back down to find the trail to the Beehive.

I followed Lake Agnes to the other end of the lake, where the trail climbed steeply again, zig-zagging up the hill with great views of the lake. I was treated to beautiful mountain views too, along the route.

After a while Lake Louise came into view again, this time a long way down. The sun was shining on it at times, emphasising the amazing colour, and a mountain dominated it at one end. With the forest, snow-capped mountains and lake, it really was a postcard view. There were some spots looking directly over the view, and I found one that was being vacated by a couple, and had lunch there.

I had contemplated going on and hiking up to a view a bit further along, but my ankle was decidedly painful by now, and I was unexpectedly tired after only a couple of hours of hiking, so I thought I would head back down again. I went back by Lake Agnes (still with line-ups waiting to be served, it must be very busy working there), and down to Lake Louise again, which had an even more striking colour in the sun.

From there I took the next shuttle bus to Moraine Lake. You couldn’t drive to that lake at all, and could only take the shuttle bus from Lake Louise to Moraine Lake if you’d taken the bus to get to Lake Louise. If you drove to Lake Louise and managed to get a park, you couldn’t take the bus to Moraine Lake.

It took about half an hour to get there. This was perhaps an even more amazing lake. It was smaller, but surrounded by several snowy mountains. I think it was probably at a higher altitude than Lake Louise. This was less crowded, but there were still a lot of people around. There was a cafe there, and I bought a hot dog and cake or something, for a fairly steep price. The seats outside the cafe were full, so I went down to the edge of the lake and found some rocks to sit on while I ate, periodically shooing away the squirrels, which were quite tame, and clearly interested in my food.

There were people kayaking on the lake. I think it was something like US$120 for a half hour for a two-person canoe. I gave it a miss! After walking around the edge of the lake a bit, I discovered a trail going up from the lake to a lookout point above. A lot of other people had discovered it too! I traipsed up with the crowds, to the crowded lookout.

The view from there really was beautiful, and I found a spot where I could take photos without trees in the way, trying to avoid the people who were ending up in the photos. It was rather cloudy, but the sun came out while I was watching the water, lighting it up in its full glory, with the mountains, and some looming clouds behind, just spectacular!

I headed back down, and was able to get a shuttle bus back to Lake Louise pretty quickly. After a last look around there, I also got onto the shuttle bus back to the car park with little delay. The Lake Louise Ski Resort near where the bus operated was a large structure made out of logs, quite impressive. From there I set my course to the town near Calgary where my aunt lives. It was about a two and a half hour drive mostly on four-lane highways, going steadily down from the mountains, getting up to 110km/h a bit after Banff. The route mostly skirted Calgary, and headed out to the east. After coming down from the mountains, the land was quite flat. The vast rolling plains were very different from the territory I had spent the last few days in.

I found my aunt Heather’s house in what turned out to be quite a small town, while it was still light. It was so good to see her in person! We had dinner and talked till quite late.

Image Gallery

I headed off to Banff Park Church, a few minutes drive from the campground, down a steep hill into the township. Google’s route included a very sharp, almost U-turn to get into town, which I wasn’t sure the van was capable of, so I took a different way. Banff Park Church was a lovely chapel, beautifully appointed inside, an A-frame meeting hall, with wood panelling. There had been a survey sent out to members and perhaps regular attendees, to see what things they thought were important. There was a nice emphasis in the sermon on outreach, the church family and the family of all believers.

After church I headed up the main highway toward Johnston Canyon. The Bow River Parkway, which ran alongside the main highway, would probably have been the shortest way to it, but it was closed for a month or two for the exclusive use of cyclists. Towards the turnoff to Johnston Canyon, I stopped and had made some lunch at a beautiful rest area overlooking the Bow River. I made lunch pretty much every day, wherever I stopped, a salad sandwich with whatever meat filling I had going at the time. I had bread, cheese, tomatoes, lettuce, and tins of things like chicken, turkey and salmon, and would open a tin, then put the rest in a container in the fridge. I was blessed with another sunny day, and it was lovely to eat lunch looking at the view of the strikingly blue river and mountains beyond.

On the way to the canyon was Silverton Falls, a short walk from the parking lot. They weren’t as dramatic as some of the other falls – I was spoiled! – but they were pretty, going down into a narrow gorge. I met an Asian couple there who were very friendly and offered to take my photo, and gave me some grapes.

Johnston Canyon, a short drive further along, was a very popular spot, with plenty of people around. There was a walk going along the narrow gorge which, as always, had a decent river running through it, and also some great waterfalls. Some parts of the walk were on balconies over the river. The gorge was quite deep in places, and the walk worked its way uphill along the river.

There was once place where there was a bridge going into a cave, where you could see one of the main waterfalls up close. You had to wait in line for your turn to have a look, I think I was there about 15 minutes till my turn came to go into a narrow passageway in the rock, which opened out to a cave with a great close-up view of the waterfall going into a pool then down again.

I walked for quite a while, past another large waterfall, then back down again, and drove back towards Banff. Just out of Banff are the Vermilion Lakes, and I drove down a little road that wound alongside the lakes, looking for somewhere to park. I found a spot, and walked along the road for half an hour or so, taking photos, and enjoying the reflections of the mountains in the lakes.

On the way back to the campsite I stopped at the Hoodoos Lookout, overlooking a kind of lumpy mountain which I think must have been the Hoodoos, and what was probably the Bow River, surrounded by forest. I started the usual weekly Bible study Facebook video call from there at 6.30, and got dinner afterwards.

Image Gallery