Friday 17th September
We flew to Calgary from LAX with Air Canada. The plane was less than half full - we had a whole row of the Airbus to ourselves. Jo had packed a wonderful dinner which we ate enroute - we were in "hospitality class" where you can buy a meal, or as in our case bring your own. It was a memorable flight, if only that it was peaceful and we were excited about our destination. They had cool earphones that hung on the outside of our ears - cheap version of the current fashion - they worked well and were more comfortable than other aircrafs head/earphones. There was a funny comedy which was done completely without speech - produced in Quebec. A bit like Candid Camera.

Whilst waiting to depart LAX we phoned the car hire company at Calgary airport as we weren't sure how to get from the arrival point to the car hire. We soon discovered that it is just like the majority of airports - follow the signs to a nearby desk. It is LAX that is in the minority - having to hail a shuttle bus to take you to the parking lot of the hire car company. We were impressed with the service, especially given the excellent deal we got from Cheap-Car-Rental.com - we had a "red" (more like deep purple) Chrysler Sebring which was near new - before departing it had 8000 km on it, and it had more than 30% more by the time we departed Canada. It was a good car for travelling in - the only problem being that our compass didn't work inside it.

Our first night was spent in a Travelodge in Calgary. The only things of note was the sound of a sports stadium nearby (football or hockey), the good breakfast - cereal and pastries, and the hotel manager was an Indian cricket fanatic.

Saturday 18th September
We spent the morning in Calgary. We drove into the city - it is somewhere between Adelaide and Melbourne in terms of size. Unfortunately the CAA (Canadian Automobile Association) was not open and so we couldn't get more maps. We wandered around some of the touristy areas and noted some of the architecture, and the lack of people. We also went to the Eau Claire markets and were disappointed. However, they were on the edge of the river, and we had a nice wander around the park on the river's edge. The river had been dammed and there were divers in the lake (no idea why). There were also more people than we had seen elsewhere in Calgary - and from the surroundings we could see why. We saw our first sign of Autumn - the trees along the river were taking on their autumn colours.

On our way out of the city, we noticed a park at the top of a hill overlooking the city and stopped to have a better look at the view. We then drove east, stopping somewhere off the highway for lunch - a small park in a lakeside residential area. We were headed for Drumheller - Dinosaur Country. On the way we listened to CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation), equivalent to the BBC or ABC - there was good reception and good quality programming.

Close to Drumheller there is a Dinosaur Trail - a route along different highways that shows some of the sights in the Drumheller area. The first place we stopped at was Horseshoe Canyon. We had spent the previous couple of hours driving through wheat country, rolling plains covered in wheat farms with their 'oh-so North American' barnes, and then suddenly there was this Canyon - not as steep sided as the Grand Canyon, but certainly different to the surrounding country side. The Canyon walls varied in colour with depth and reminded us of areas we had driven through east of the Grand Canyon, Arizona.

The Dinosaur Trail included a number of lookouts and a tiny Chappel - seats thousands, six at a time. The trail also crossed the Red Deer River on the Bleriot Ferry, one of the few ferries still left in Canada. The trip was quite scenic - the sudden change from river valley to wheat fields was dramatic.

The town of Drumheller was dinosaur crazy. There were dinosaurs (some a metre or two long or tall) in people's front yards, in parks, car parks and petrol stations. There were dinosaurs on street lamps, signs, and the biggest T-Rex in the world near the information centre.

We drove to the ghost town of Wayne via a road with eleven bridges in six kilometres. All bar one were one-lane bridges. The town was once a mining town, but like most of the mines in the area they had closed since the value of coal dropped or mining costs increased such that the expense of mining outweighed the benefits. The bridges were now the town's claim to fame. We finished off the day with dinner in our room - tinned raviolli with fresh mushrooms heated in the microwave, and fresh bread.

Sunday 19th September
We drove to the hoodoos east of Drumheller and admired an old coal mine from a distance. After that, we took a look in the Information Center and gift shop at the Royal Tyrell Museum - we didn't have enough time to justify the expense of visiting the museum itself.

We drove on to Edmonton, taking a detour to Dry Island Buffalo Jump, a beautiful provincial park (ie state park), where we ate lunch overlooking the valley, from near the Buffalo Jump - a place where the indigenous inhabitants had herded buffalo over the edge as a way of slaughtering them. The valley was beautiful - evergreens and deciduous trees in various shades of yellow, and a river running through the middle. We spied a Golden-mantled ground squirrel, probably after it had spied us and it was kind enough to pose for us.

We drove into the valley along a steep narrow dirt road and admired the scenery. The peacefulness, the colours - it looked like a small slice of heaven.

Sunday night was spent in Edmonton, near our Monday destination - the West Edmonton Mall. We didn't have time to see much at all of Edmonton. Martin Chao, the software team manager from Rob's work had highly recommended the West Edmonton Mall (WEM). Dinner was KFC.

Monday 20th September
We were waiting outside the CAA when it opened, and the staff were very helpful. We were soon on our way with maps and brochures of the Rocky Mountains.

West Edmonton Mall - until a larger mall opened in Minnesota, the WEM was the largest mall in North America. We walked all round it inside. It is huge - something like 40 blocks equivalent. Some things of note were:

Ice skating rink - seniors hour was great to see all the seniors skaing around - it looked so graceful.
Mini Golf - a whole mini golf course ran down the middle of one section.
RCMP Store - mountie souveniers.
Bose Store - we couldn't afford any of it, but they gave a cool demo (10 minutes) in a small theatre and gave us a Bose soup mug as a souvenier.
Water Park - a huge indoor water park with numerous water slides, and a huge wave pool. There were rows of deck chairs with people laid back and relaxing - just like the beach, minus the sand. The waves sometimes lapped at the feet of the deck chairs. Quite a clever idea - a beach for people who are maybe 800 km from a beach and who have below 0°C temperatures for all of winter.
Underwater Adventure - small submarines took passengers around an underwater land. Didn't see any live fish from where we stood on the "shore". This was right in the middle of the mall.
Death by Chocolate - bought a slice of chocolate cheesecake to eat on the road.
Underground heated parking - was advertised at the WEM, and we saw some cars with power cords poking out near the front numberplate.

There was also an adventure park with rollercoasters off to one side of the mall. We didn't have time to partake of any of the attractions, but could see this as being a great family destination - one parent goes shopping whilst the other parent accompanies the kids to one of the attractions.

We drove to Jasper in the afternoon. The road was excellent! There were lots of trucks at times. We got to a point where we could start to see the mountains - it certainly was exciting to see them. But, once amongst the Rockys it was just amazing. The sky was clear and the combination of snow, huge mountains and gree forests was incredible. Such a contrast to both the rolling plains of central Alberta, and to the concrete jungle of LA. What beauty God has created for our enjoyment.

We drove through valleys until we came to Jasper, a tourist town in Jasper National Park. It is quite a pretty town with amazing scenery. We stayed the night at Pyramid Lake about 5km from Jasper, in a log cabin - well, it was really a hotel room but looked like a log cabin from the outside. We were hoping to eat at a place recommended by the Lonely Planet guide book, but it was cloased and so we ate pizza at a pleasant and rustic pizza joint in Jasper.

It was a lot more cloudy than earlier in the day, but that didn't stop some beautiful reflections in a pond we passed. A common theme of the Rocky Mountains is small lakes with beautiful reflections. Another is people stopping on the road to look at scenery or wild life. We always pulled off to the side and then people would drive past really slowly to try and see what we were looking at/photographing. We were amused by the people who stopped in the middle of the road without even trying to pull off the road.

Tuesday 21st September
We started early, declining the extremely inviting smell of a cooked breakfast in the resort restaurant, and headed for Malign Lake. We had read that the road to the lake would provide opportunities for wildlife viewing, and some interesting canyons. Malign Canyon was very narrow and deep - narrow enough to probably just jump across in places, but up to 30 m deep in places. The limestone ???? through which the canyon had carved itself was not regular at all and so in places one could not see the water at the bottom - curves so smooth and polished, and walls that curved in and out.

We stopped at Medicine Lake to admire the view, and soon saw a pack of Longhorn Sheep coming towards us, and the bus tour group who were there. The sheep like the salts or some ???? in the rocks next to the lake, and so had their heads in the rocks. As we drove towards Malign Lake we saw what we think was an Elk drinking from a stream.

It was quite cold at Malign Lake and the major tourist attraction is taking a boat trip out on the lake. We wandered about taking photos and then headed back to Jasper.

The Parks Canada office in Jasper was very helpful and highly recommended the Glaciers of Mount Edith Cavell to us. So, we drove the windy and potholed road to the parking lot, ate lunch and then rugged up for the walk. We walked along a trail over the glacial moraine for a kilometer or two. Ahead and to the right was a towering mountain with snow capped peaks - Mt Edith Cavell (a Canadian nurse who had been to the first world war ???), which held Ghost, Cavell and Angel Glaciers . As we walked up the moraine we could see Angel Glacier coming down a valley. Further up the mountain end, it stopped and appeared to hang off the side of the mountain. The blue of its bare end was an incredible colour. Not until right near the end of the walk did we see our destination - the glacier right in front of us, and a small glacial lake between us.

The lake was blue-green, sort of teal in colour, and was part frozen. Floating in the lake, and scattered on the shore were chunks of ice from the glacier. There was a tour group sitting amongst the ice on the rocks eating their lunch. Towering over the lake were the snow-covered peaks of Mt Edith Cavell and the Cavell and Ghost glaciers. It was an incredible sight.

From there we drove south along the Icefields Parkway, said, and we wholeheartedly agree, to be one of the most spectacular stretches of road in the world - ???? kilometers of mountains, valleys, glaciers, forests and lakes.

We stopped at a number of places along the way:

• Athabasca Falls - an incredible quantity of water rushing through this narrow gap. It had formed a natural bridge and a narrow and deep gorge.
• Athabasca Glacier - we had been hoping to make it in time for a snow coach ride up onto the glacier. Unfortunately we ran out of time and so drove to the carpark at the foot of the glacier. It was cold and windy and a little sleet was falling. As we climbed the moraine towards the glacier, the wind became stronger until the point where the sleet was tiny shards of ice being slammed into our faces (the only bit of exposed skin). We got the the point where we could just see the glacier, and turned around. The wind was just too strong to kae it possible to get up onto the glacier. It certainly didn't look as beautiful as the angel glacier we'd seen earlier in the day.
• Mountain Goats - we saw a car stopped along the highway and a group looking at the mountainside with binoculars, so we pulled over and looked to see white dots on the side of the mountain. They were mountain goats and were very white. They have long beards and are not like your average wild goat in Australia.

It was after sunset when we arrived in Lake Louise and checked into the Deer Lodge. Our room was small and hot! It was probably only a couple of degrees C outside, and we warmed up quickly. The problem was it was too hot - so we opened the window and this moderated the temperature. Jo worked it out - the heating pipes ran through the wall and a whoe section of the wall was radiating warmth into the room.

The Deer Lodge was an old style deep hunting lodge, and had a beautiful lounge complete with piano, buffalo head on the wall, lounge chairs and a writing desk. Not that we had time to do anything more than admire it.

Wednesday 22nd September
Lake Louise is just beautiful. We walked past the Chateau Lake Louise, a huge hotel on the shore of the glacial lake, and along a trail along the northern shore. It was drizzling a little and whilst it caused the lake reflections to be slightly ripply, it didn't detract from the beauty. In the valley above the western end of the lake is the glacier which feeds the lake. There were many people on the trail admiring the beautiful scenery. Whilst walking we heard the noise of rocks falling off the side of a mountain - it occurred a couple of times, but at no time did we see the rocks falling or any evidence of it happening. It was difficult to tell if it was across the lake, or a reflection from across the lake of what was happening on our side of the lake up through the forest. We stopped near the western end of the lake and before turning back saw a Pica ???? running around amongst the rocks. It was very cute and kind enough to stop and let us take its photograph, though scurried away when we tried pointing it out to others on the trail.

Moraine Lake, an even more beautiful and less visited neighbour of Lake Louise was rippling from the mid-morning breeze and there were lots of tourists about, so we headed north to see some of the Icefields Parkway that was too dark to see the previous evening.

Peyto Lake is best viewed from a lookout which we walked to up a steep track past lots of different types of mushrooms in the undergrowth. The weather was rapidly oscillating from bright and sunny to light rain and wind. The view was spectacular anyway. Peyto Lake was an even stronger light blue green than any of the other glacial lakes we had seen. The colour is caused by finely suspended particles reflecting the light. These fine particles are ground by the action of the glacial ice on the rocks they pass over. We could also see up the valley along where we had travelled the previous evening.

We then travelled to Banff along the scenic route (Bow Valley Parkway), passing more beautiful scenery and fields of trees golden with their autumn leaves. We took a walk up Johnston Canyon trail, which weaved up the canyon, someplaces on walkways suspended from the sides of the canyon. We walked up as far as the first waterfall.On the way we saw a train travelling through the valley with Banff in the distance. Banff is a pretty mountain town, very touristy with endless souvenier shops. Quite a bit larger than Jasper. We were there for dinner and souveniers.

We took the recommendation of a AAA book we'd bought and went to ????. Its entrance was a door and stairs to the second floor in the middle of a shopping street. We walked though the rustic looking bar to the restaurant at the back. It was certainly a sight - all the walls and the ceiling were covered in miscellania - from a model plane, to snow skies, photographs of a local swim suit contest in the 60s, local artifacts, and signs from ski resorts. The service was great - and multilingual if required. We wanted to try the famed Alberta beef - and it was good in steak and burger form. Rob tried a Canadian Cider which was ok. We had been amazed that Cadbury also make chocolate in Canada and were enjoying trying the odd bar that was different to Australia (no Cadbury in the USA, except made by Hersheys). Jo was disappointed to see that Canadian picnic bars contain raisins/sultanas.

Thursday 23rd September
We arrived at Moraine Lake before the crowds and whilst the surface was still mirror-like. It was just magnificent and we took many photos. The water was so still that when some tourists started skipping rocks on the lake, the ripples could be seen radiating all the way to the other side of the lake.

We travelled across the Rocky Mountains - driving for most of the day. Along the way we passed through a number of National Parks, and stopped for a number of sights. The first was the spiral tunnels. The railroad which crosses the Rocky Mountains have two spiral tunnels to assist with reducing the gradient to something manageable by the trains. Inside the mountain the tunnel makes a gradual ~270° turn and comes out of the mountain above, but not far from where it went in. We were fortunate enough to see a train traverse one of these spirals, and stood in the rain with a couple of tour groups watching the spectacle. We had read that wilst we saw a passenger train, a freight train is more spectacular as one end is crossing above the other due to the length of the train.

Further on into Yoho National Park we walked to Takakaw Falls, the second highest waterfalls in Canada. There was not a lot of water coming over them - we saw photos which showed them in spring with a tremendous amount of water flowing over them. The river which we crossed to get to the falls was a blue-green colour like a number of the lakes we had seen. It reminded us of the coloured water used at theme parks like Disneyland to make the water look more natural (and therefore it looks even more fake) - it was fascinating that the blue green colour was even visible in a river.

We travelled though Glacier National Park and through the clouds saw more glaciers filling valleys between mountain peaks and hanging over the edges of others.

In Mt Revelstoke National Park we drove along the "Meadows in the Sky" parkway up Mt Revelstoke to Balsom Lake. Unfortunately the bus was not running and we didn't feel like walking the 2 km to the top so walked to a view point where we saw clouds. We decided to try another train, and were surprised when the couple in front of us reappeared quickly - we thought the trail was longer. However, they had not reached the end of the trail at all but had startled a Grizzly bear which had reared up, scaring them off. So, cameras in hand, we walked on until we saw the Grizzly forraging in the undergrowth. Fortunately, the Grizzly ignored us and went about, nose in the bushes, finding food. It was quite active - we read somewhere that the bears need to spend many hours a day forraging otherwise they go hungry - and no one wants to see a hungry bear :-)

We admired the log hut which had been built near the carpark - it was typical of the style of buildings we saw every so often in our travels through the mountains - large logs crisscorssed at the corners giving a solid thick wall to the building.

As we got down off the mountains, we passed lake and riverside communities. One was ????, the houseboat capital of Canada. Having experience the whole houseboat thing in SA on the Murray River we were captivated by the sight of houseboats motoring out of the marina and into the wide expanse of lake ????. Unlike the Murray River the majority of the lake shore was remote from any roads or properties. The map showed numerous camping sites surrounding the lake most of which were accessible only by boat.

We arrived in Kamloops after dark, and enjoyed strolling through the local supermaket and seeing some new and different foods. Rob tried "cottage chees with fruit" just like fruit yoghurt except cottage cheese instead of yoghurt. It was different - not sure if he'd try it again, but tasted ok.

Friday 24th September
We stayed in Kamloops for two nights, and spent Friday in Wells Grey Provincial Park, an hour and a half north of Kamloops. It was beautiful countryside - there are few roads in the park and we took the one from the southern entrance which roughly followed the path of the river running from Lake ???? through the park. Our first stop was at a lookout along the river valley and we saw the golden autumn leaves in greater profusion than we'd seen in the Rocky Mountains.

We walked to ???? falls which were quite tall and very loud. The water pounding into the base of the waterfall rebounded in great sprays - we were quite a long way from the bottom and so kept dry.

At the peak of ???? there is a fire tower where we ate lunch and admired the 360° view of the park. There were snow capped mountains in the distance, and many miles of rolling hills in between. Around the tower large flies fluttered, though they rarely stayed still long enough to capture with the camera.

An early settler in the area built a ranch and kept cattle and grew crops. The remains of the house and some fences are still visible. We made the mistake of thinking we might see moose or other wildlife if we continued around the loop trail, but had misread the map. So, an hour later, having seen a natural spring, and other walkers we came to the main road. Realising it would be quicker back along the road to the car than back the way we came, Rob headed along the road to collect the car.

We continued into the lake where we saw why it is a popular spot people went to get away (and like the water). There were camping spots amongst the trees and many boat trailers - we could see on the map that the remaining camping sites were accessible only by boat, and were spread around the lake. Fishing is said to be good there, and it looked like a great place to spend a long weekend. We were aiming to be back in Kamloops to do washing and eat dinner, so we hit the road.

Saturday 25th September - Kamloops to Victoria, Vancouver Island
We set off down the ???? river valley travelling south west. Along the way we stopped at Hell's Gate where a cable car takes willing tourists to the bottom of the river gorge. This was rapids country - many rafters could be seen at different times along the river.

The train line following the river was interresting - each side of the river was a train line, and trains travelled in opposite directions on them. Due to avalanches there were covered sections of track, making an interesting sight as the train transversed the windy gorge.

There were fruit stands at times on the roadside selling local produce. There were also tunnels which the road went through. We were intreagued by the "remove sunglasses" signs at the tunnel entrances.

We stopped and took a walk to an old suspension bridge which had been superseeded by a larger and longer bridge further down river. It was in quite a pleasant setting, with all the autumn colours in the trees along the river.

We stopped briefly in ???? to sample the produce at DQ (Dairy Queen) and admire a number of carved wooden statues in the town. We didn't stop again until we were in line at the British Columbia Ferry wharf waiting to sail to Vancouver Island. The sun was setting and was spectacular. When in the Rocky Mountains, we had asked a Parks Canada ranger where we would see good sunsets, and were told that there weren't particularly good sunsets in the mountains. So, we were thrilled by the view from the wharf. It reminded us both of lining up for the Spirit of Tasmania ferry in Devonport when on our honeymoon - that time we were also sailing to Victoria - the state of Australia, not the Canadian city. The ferry ride was about one and a half hours and we wandered about the ferry enjoying the views until the sun set.

Once the ferry docked, we drove into the city of Victoria. We had read that Victoria was a little piece of England, or that's the way they promoted it. Not having been to England, we have nothing to compare it with. We stayed in the Cherry Bank Hotel, a B&B turned small hotel in a room without TV or phone, but with a four poster bed. It was furnished with a Queen Anne chair and little table, and a tiny bathroom, but exactly what we wanted.

Sunday 26th September
We followed a walking tour of the city from the tour book we bought from the AAA. Victoria is the Capital of BC and the parliamentary buildings were quite impressive - very English in appearance. Nearby was the Royal Museum of British Columbia which is said the be very extensive, though we didn't have time to look at more than the totem poles outside. Next was the Empire (Empress?) Hotel, a large 19th century/early 20th century imposing structure with lovely gardens and a great waterfront location. The city reminded us a bit of Hobart, Tasmania, with the waterfront, the small size and few tall buildings. We walked through tourist shops (of which there were endless numbers of), art, food stops, past restaurants trying to get us to eat at their establishment, and past a great looking bagel shop. We came to an outdoor market and took a look around it - it had local products and was close to Chinatown and we walked down Fan Tang Alley (????) which was exceedingly narrow and no longer the notorious place it had once been. We back tracked to the bagel shop for lunch, though we couldn't remember exactly where it was and did walk around many blocks before finally locating it. It was worth it - the bagels were fresh and were filled with fresh and tasty ingredients.

After lunch, we walked up to the ???? park which was full of families out for a stroll amongst the flowers, trees and wildlife. At the far end of the park was the tallest totem pole we'd seen (????). Across the road was a view of the ocean - we could see the USA and what we think was Mt Olympus in Olympic National Park, Washington, on the ???? peninsular.

The walk back to the hotel, through the suburbs of Victoria, showed us how nice a place it must be to live in. It reminded us of Hobart or Canberra. Leafy streets, nice houses - not large or closely packed like LA.

We ate dinner in a restaurant with a view of the harbour - we sat outside, but unlike Kincaid's in Redondo Beach where we ate soon after arriving and froze, this restaurant had enclosed the deck in glass up to eye height and had large heaters above us.

Monday 27th September
We had talked to the desk clerk the previous night about which ferry we should catch from Vancouver Island back to Vancouver in the morning. We were concerned that we might have to miss breakfast if we left too early. Fortunately, they were able to serve us a cold breakfast when we got up. The waitress was going to Australia after the Hotel closed (it was being demolished to make way for new appartments, the owner having given in after the ban on smoking had come into effect), and so we gave her a tip in Australian dollars, much to her delight. We made it to our intended ferry on time, however, it was late leaving due to fog.

The trip to Vancouver was more interesting than the previous direction as we could see the islands around which we sailed, many with houses on their shores and jetties in front of each house. The ferry delay caused us to be quite late arriving at Vancouver airport, and an Air Canada employee directing us told us so. Unfortunately, Rob realised he'd left the camera in the hire car and had to spring to the car hire lot and back. Then we had to go through US Immigration and Customs - the large Canadian airports have tiny spots of US Territory so that no processing is required at the plane's destination. They recommended a couple of hours for check-in, immigration, and customs. To our delight, we were able to bypass the queue of a hundred or so in Immigration, as we saw a sign "Air Crew and Diplomatic Passports" - and we were the only people in line. We made it to the aircraft in time (probably to the distinct surprise of the Air Cananda staff) and had an uneventful flight home, albeit sitting across from each other in aisle seats, as unlike the flight to Canada, the plane was packed with people.