Canadian Rockies 4
It really is amazing how much you can see by foot. Cyclists groaned up the steep roads, cars whizzed by, passengers gawking, but we hikers are most personal with the landscape. We see rocks, or we trip over them; we examine flowers; we glory in the views; we crane our necks to see beauty in every direction, so magnificent it made us cry.
Helen Lake wasn’t a great lake, so we decided to go for another one on Monday July 18th: Lake Annette/Paradise Valley. Again, the more adventuresome could go farther; Annette Lake was a 7 mile hike, but Paradise Valley another 4.3.
But our plans were not to work out. First, I left my hiking boots! I thought they remained in the van, but they were secured in the closet at our condo. Oops! Well, I figured with help on the downhills I could walk pretty far in my Birkenstocks.
After another beautiful drive, we got near the trailhead and noticed cars going the opposite direction. We’d been teasing about bears all week so Vika said, "It was probably the bears."
After we got about a half mile up the trail, we found she was right! There was a sign warning of bears, and stating it was illegal to hike in groups of fewer than six, and that the six had to stay no more than a few feet apart.
We decided that if bears had been there (and, the girls decided, chewed the mauled sign!) That meant we weren’t to go. We looked at the map and decided to hike up from Lake Louise, which was nearby. It’s pretty touristy, but this was not a weekend.
By then it was late afternoon and Lake Louise was crowded. We saw what drew the crowds: The amazing scenery: Glaciers, mountains, firs, lake – everything! It was a very international crowd, with few English speakers and even fewer Americans. Lots of Japanese.
We saw directions to Tea Houses, which inspired our interest for Tuesday, our last day’s hike.
We got home, had leftovers, and crashed. So far, we hadn’t eaten a single meal out, nor had we wanted to.