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Published: July 12th 2010
It's a super simple idea...
Sell all of your things, move to South Korea to teach english!
except no one predict the bumps in the travel road between moving out of Calgary and actually reaching
our destination at Gyeonggi English Village.
So, while we try to avoid confrontation with the in-law's while crashing in their home, we've decided to take short trips around Northern Alberta, to pass the time!
PART 1 Since, I have never been to Jasper National Park and Shauna hadn't ever been to Miette Hot Springs, we packed up the rental car (which will cost two arms & a leg in the end) and drove the 3 1/2 hours West, to enjoy the views surrounding the Northern Canadian Rocky Mountains!
Jasper, is a small tourist town, with it's tourist season being in the summer and not in the winter! IF you are a skier/boarder, then you might want to check out Marmot Basin, when you have a moment. It's steep rugged terrain is world reknowned and it's more like a "locals mountain" then a ski resort!
However, that is a winter time thing and this is a
The Entrance to
Jasper National Park, is not the grandest of entrances but soon enough the landscape takes your breath away!summer road trip...
We spent two-nights crashing in the 1938 built log cabins of Miette Hot Springs Resort Motel. It was fabulously old and hotter than a sauna! The Miette Hot Springs are piping hot coming out of the mountain at 56.4 degrees Celcius! OUCH! But by the time the trickly hot water reaches the hot springs pools maintained by Parks Canada, they have extracted a few minerals and a few degrees.
There are 4 pools at the Miette Hot Springs. Two are Hot Spring pools and Two are Cold dipping pools.
Ironically, there is nothing "cold" about these last two pools, at 15c (59f) and 20c (73f) degrees! But to say they aren't as warm as the Hot pools is an undersight at 30c (87f) and 40c (104f). Now you can understand that jumping out of the 40c pool into the 15c pool will feel like you just joined the Polar Bear Club! But honestly this isn't the most ridiculous pool I've ever stepped foot/feet into.
Onsen, in Japan is a Hot Spring haven for bathers. Bathers go just to bath and rest in their pools of hot water, cold water, steam saunas, water saunas and electrical
Welcoming Committee
to Miette Hot Springs baths (no joke). The latter is the bath, I am speaking about. It's about half the size of a claw iron tub and twice as wide. Inside the bath, are two 12x3 inch strips of metal attached to the bath. From these metal strips on opposing sides of the bath, they shoot electrical currents across. And until you decide to put both your feet into the tub, it just feels like a nice relaxing pool of water. But if you want to know what 15-volts of electric current feels like, they just dip your second foot in for a jolting result!
But that was another time in another place far far away...
Upon checking in for our first night we were given the keys to suite #57 that would have slept 6-people easily! Included in this three room layout was two queen beds in separate rooms; one room had a dresser, tv and fan with a door leading to the bathroom the size of a broom closet! The other room had a table that sat four people, twin trash cans, dodgy lights, a bar fridge set to frozen and an old closet that now housed the bunk-beds!
Piping Hot
At 130.28 degree Fahrenheit the Miette Hot Spring, may just be one of the hottest original springs in Canada. That's a piping hot 54.6 Celsius! We spent our first night at the Hot Springs Motel, just wandering around, checking out the old mountain springs location, taking a short hike, eating crackers, fine cheese and drinking a bottle of wine then doing what ever North American does on vacation and watched a tv show; Criminal Minds. But mainly because we forgot to bring a deck of cards with us? oops!
The following morning after a night of sleep on a very springy queen size bed, we jolted awake and headed for the hot springs, to melt away our morning. Once we reached the front desk, we paid our $8.55 per person for an all-day wrist band. From that moment forward, it was all about relaxation. Or in my case hanging out until Shauna was ready to leave.
The plans were to eat our strawberry, blueberry, fieldberry, granola and yogurt breakfast then head out to Maligne Lake, to try our hands at canoeing and taking in some clean mountain air. Then head back to Jasper, the town, have a bite to eat and wander around searching out our next day's adventure!
Once, Shauna was happy to get out of the hot springs, a couple
Another Friend
Shauna was giggly like a school girl when she caught sight of this little ground squirrel and just needed a photograph! We played hide-and-seek with him for 25-minutes! of hours later. And once I had joined the idiots who spring from a 40c hot pool of water and then jump directly into a 15c pool of cold water to jolt the morning system into SHOCK, we climbed out and headed for the motel front desk, to inquire about a room for the 2nd night.
The front desk lady jumped into action to find out if room #38 was available at that precise moment and five minutes later we exchanged our keys. We packed up room #57 and drove around the complex to our new digs for the night. Room #57 had set us back a mere $100 plus taxes and room #38 would set us back $102 plus taxes. The question on our minds was what made room #38 $2.00 more expensive?
Upon entering room #38, it was definitely apparent! We were given a twin top gas stove, full size refrigerator, eating bench, sink, plates, silverware, tea pot, coffee perculator, two sitting chairs, a firm queen size bed and two night tables with lights. We were both happy. Plus the view off the back was of the nice trees and hills, instead of the noise from
Discoloration
A few of the original pool house walls still stand but have been discolored through the years of contact with the sulphur springs in the area. people entering the building. The $2.00 upgrade was worth it, even the bathroom was bigger, bonus!
We tossed in our stuff, grabbed what we wanted for the day and drove off to Maligne Lake before eating breakfast because the bar fridge had frozen the yogurt, peaches and everything else inside. We figured by the time we reached Maligne lake (45 minute drive) then everything would be thawed out enough to enjoy its edible nature!
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