Banff

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We woke up early yesterday at Emerald Lake Lodge and decided to head down to the lake to get some photos. The weather was better and the lake was more still. We wandered down to the bridge that leads to the lodges from the tourist car park. There were very few people around and it was so peaceful and still. The blue colour was really shining through as well. After walking about for a bit we decided to have breakfast here before heading on to Banff. We had gingerbread pancakes and coffee which was good. Once we finished breakfast it was back to the lodge before wheeling the cases down the hill to the main reception to check out and get the shuttle bus back to the car. As we were heading to the reception we spotted a couple of canoes out on the still lake. Steph was gutted as one of the things she wanted to do was go canoeing but it's the one thing we haven't managed to fit in.

All loaded up with set the sat nav to Banff which was only about an hours drive. There was a stop we wanted to make on the way for another hike at Johnstone Canyon. We drove for a bit then saw the sign to turn off down the Bow Valley Parkway. This road runs alongside the Icefields parkway but is closed at various points during the year as its a nature 'corridor' and they close the road so the Bears and deers can feed. We had to drive 17km along this road back up the way we had came. Turning a bend there was a car and motor home pulled over with hazard warning lights flashing. We've learned that this usually means wildlife has been spotted. Sure enough there was a family of deer right by the road. I pulled over and Steph tried to take some photos. We then carried on along the road with Steph on 'bear watch' as we called it but didn't see anything else. Once at the canyon the car park was very busy. We've had several instances of driving down long and what seem to be desolate roads to find a whole load of cars and motor homes parked up at the bottom! We managed to park up then get our hiking boots on and set off once again!

At Johnstone Canyon there are three main viewpoints. The lower falls which were 0.5km from the car park (uphill!), the upper falls 1.5km and the ink pots were 4km away. We started walking and both agreed on the way that we were only going at far as the upper falls as we were too tired to go uphill another 8km round trip after all the other hikes we've done. We set off on the hike which went up and up. The river carves its way through the rocks and over the years has created a canyon eroding the rock away as it winds through the hillside. We can across the lower falls and had a great view. There was a small opening that looked like a cave which you could climb through. It went very close to the falls so you got soaked from the spray! Back and heading towards to the upper falls we came across a cute chipmunk running back and forth across the path. The path up to see the falls had various sections which were bolted into the side of the rock over nothing but the rushing river below. I tried not to think about it too much as I don't like bridges like that especially when some of the planks on the bridges had holes in and even moved when you trod on them! The upper falls were pretty and powerful too and we had to walk along one of the bridges attached to rock again and the end stuck right out about 20 feet from the side of the rock above the river. Once we took some photos we took the long walk back down to the car.

Back in the car park we saw lots of Canadian park workers writing tickets out and putting them on cars. It was bank holiday Monday and they were ticketing the cars that didn't have their park pass showing. Ours was taped to the window so we were ok. We then headed on to Banff. We arrived in Banff about 3.20pm and checked into the hotel arranging car parking. We found that this was the only hotel do far not to have any free wifi which was typical as we needed to check in online for our flight to Toronto tomorrow. Luckily a quick wander round Banff and we came across a Starbucks and used their free wifi by loitering outside! Flight checked in and checked baggage purchased we then headed to 'The Old Spaghetti Factory' which was a restaurant. We got a bargain meal of starter and main with an alcoholic drink each and garlic bread for $40 (£20) for the two of us.

After dinner we headed back to the hotel via Starbucks for more free wifi to find the directions to the hot springs in Upper Banff before getting in the car with our swimming stuff and heading up to the hot springs. It was about 7.30pm and they were open til 11pm so we had plenty of time. They were only about 8mins away from our hotel in the car. The hot springs were actually like an outdoor swimming pool where everyone just chilled in. There was about 120 people in there at one point. It was nice with the mountains in the background with snow on the top. After about 45 mins we were very hot and sleepy so got out and changed and headed back to the hotel. Once there it was time to do a 'Depack-Repack' of the luggage, which means taking everything out to repack it and make sure it was the correct weight. Steph did half a job but I decided to do it properly and now hopefully I only need to access the top part of my case for the last few days. After sorting the cases out it was time to get to bed and set the alarms for 6am!

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