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When we arrived in Calgary the car troubles were starting to get a little worse but it was still driveable. We were welcomed by family friends given a beautiful home to stay in for 2 nights. Again we took full advantage of showering, cleaning up, and beds. We decided to go out a few nights in Calgary and treat ourselves to a bit of partying. We ended up having too good of a time and spent a little too much money, but we learnt our lessons.
Before leaving Calgary we hoped in a river raft and cruised down the Bow River, it was a little chilly and out of season, but was pretty sweet. We left Calgary and started driving into mountains; it was definitely much better driving than the prairie’s. This was the part of the drive we were looking most forward too, every mountain was memorizing.
We drove about hour into the mountains and arrived at Banff. We scouted out a nice parking lot and picked out the spot for the night. We only planned on staying one night in Banff but the whole atmosphere of a little mountain town intrigued us. It’s not tourist
season in Banff yet so it’s mainly all locals, they are all friendly people with very care free living. We went out to the bars both nights and had some more good times. We also hiked up Tunnel Mountain in Banff to get a nice view of all the mountains around us. We went to Lake Louise and tested our luck and hiked and on avalanche danger trail right up around the lake and into the glacier. It was a little nerve racking walking right over previous avalanche spots but it was definitely worth it.
Next we decided to head even more north into the mountains to Jasper. On the way we stopped at the world famous Columbia Ice field. It stretches 250km by 250km and is as deep as the Eiffel tower. We hiked up and got a few pictures on the toe of the Athabasca glacier which is just a small section of ice field.
Since we were in Jasper National park, there were tons of lookout points and hikes to do so we had to pick and choose which ones looked the best. We stopped at Athabasca falls and tried our luck
with some trout fishing but came out empty handed again. We kept driving up to Jasper and stopped at few little lakes and streams along the way.
Once we made it to Jasper, the car was getting a lot worse. Gas tank was starting to leak, and the strut noise was getting worse. We slept in the car again in Jasper and woke up and explored the town. It’s a real tourist town just like Banff but with an even more rustic feel to it. We went and saw Maligne Canyon and some of the surrounding lakes. We were going to take the gondola up the mountain but as soon as we started driving we heard squealing from the brakes. Anything with the brakes was very concerning due to the massive hills on the mountain highways. Also this was the Saturday of the long weekend- May 24- and it would cost us an arm and leg to find a mechanic in Jasper. We decided to camp out in front of a best western and steal some Wi-Fi until Tuesday morning, and then junk the car. She made it 4897km for us, almost all the way to
Vancouver.
Another stroke of bad luck we got was the fact that we are in a national park we cannot junk the car; it must be towed out the park to dispose of.
Seeing that we were down on or luck Ben’s mom sent us a little gift and got us a hotel for one night Jasper before Tuesday. It was an awesome present to get a nice bed, warm sauna and hot tub, and nice shower, and it was perfect timing too. A big thanks to her for putting some big smiles on the boys faces for the night.
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Mike and Cathy DeVos
non-member comment
The Car??
Hi Josh....we are following your blog and are fascinated by what you have done so far!! Just finished reading about your car, are you able to fix it? Wondering where you go from here? Mike and I would like to help out somehow. If in fact you are getting your car fixed we would like to help out with the payment as we would like to see you finish your car driving experience and make it to California. Please let us know as soon as you can, how we can help!! Love the DeVos family