Monday September 11th
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.
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