Blogs from Jasper, Alberta, Canada, North America - page 4

Once again, a particularly beautiful setting for a hotel, the Fairmont Jasper Lodge. The world famous Jasper golf course is in the grounds of the hotel. Our cabin sits near the edge of the lake and we can see a wedding rehearsal nearby. Many of the young staff here, as elsewhere in Canada, are from Australia. In fact many resorts and attractions have their employees’ name, as well as their city and country, on their nametag. The boy who delivered our luggage is from Grafton. He is particularly excited to hear that there are people from Bellingen and Coffs Harbor in our group. It is always good to hear someone from home when you are living far away. He has been here for 15 months. Our free choice activity this morning was rafting down the Athabasca ... read more

So back when I moved away to Spain last year, I left my boyfriend Doug behind, but we kept our relationship going (thank you skype). I went home briefly for a long weekend in February, and then Doug moved to Canada in June two weeks before I returned home from Spain. Despite the multiple time zones and the difficulties long distance causes, our relationship kept going strong, and I was able to fly from Korea to Canada to see him for my two-week winter vacation! I flew into Calgary, where despite travelling for about 20 hours, an hour had only passed on the clock. I was so excited leaving the airport to see all the snow and had to keep pinching myself to make sure I wasn't dreaming. And to see Doug in the flesh again ... read more

Finally, after writing our first entry only to have the P.C. freeze on us we've got our blog started!!! We started out 11 days ago with a managable 7hour 20 min flight into Toronto and a couple of hours on trains and buses to get to our Super 8 Hotel in Chinatown, downtown Toronto. Needless to say we ate Chinese the first night but ordered way too much and took half of it away in cartons to eat!! Next day we rose early, had breakfast and set off to explore Toronto. First stop the CN Tower. The weather was great, about 16 degrees and clear blue skies, so the views from 347 metres up the tower were amazing. The glass floor and glass bottomed lift was a little scary but exciting! (I persuaded Shelly onto the ... read more

Just a few snaps from our time here.... Lovely falls at Athabasca... read more

Having arrived in Jasper after cycling all the way from Lake Louise over the preceding five days, I was on my way to the HI hostel on the lower slopes of Whistlers Mountain (just outside Jasper) when suddenly I came upon a black bear nibbling away on some bushes by the side of the road just below me - my third bear sighting in less than thirty-six hours! Not much else was achieved that afternoon however, as I lazed around the hostel taking advantage of my first opportunity in five days to have an actual shower and eat something other than pasta and sauce, before retiring to my 44-bed dorm room! Determined to pack as much into my remaining two days in Jasper as possible, I was most disappointed to rise the following morning (saturday 28th ... read more