Day 4, Lake Louise to Banff

Another rainy day as we head from Lake Louise for a relatively short ride of 65 km to Banff.  We awoke to cold, about 5 degrees and a steady drizzle.  Cold leftover sandwiches, bananas and coffee got us started and we headed out on the Bow Valley Parkway, which is an older and reportedly quiet road that parallels the Trans-Canada Highway and promises to be a much nicer ride.

Entering the Bow Valley Parkway

The Bow Valley Parkway is closed every night from 8 p.m. until 8 a.m. because there is a lot of wildlife – Grizzly bears, wolves and cougar in the area and they want to give them their space.  They also close the road most of the winter for the wildlife.  We were hoping to see some animals along the way.  We got to one small hill that wound through the thick forest and there were signs that said a bear was in the area and we should be wary.  We were the only thing on the road and I rang the little bell on the bike as we slowly went up the hill, just to be wary.  (I’d like to see a Grizzly, but not when I’m going uphill at 12 kph.)

We didn’t see any wildlife, but we did see lots of rain!  Steady and cold all day.  Our rain gear keeps us pretty warm and dry, and except for our gloves, we’re in good shape.  The gloves get soaked after about 30 minutes in the rain, but they are warm enough.  The few cars that pass us think that we’re nuts but are very courteous.  We see the occasional cyclist, maybe one or two per day, but it is mostly quiet.  For the first 2 hours we counted 5 cars and 0 animals.

The roads are lined with wildflowers and if the weather was better we'd take more photos.  There is lupine and shooting stars, paintbrush and some balsam arrowroot.  Also lots that we don't know their names.  There are small delicate white flowers that remind us of trillium (but are not).

Unknown wildflower

We had read about the Canadian internment camps from the first world war.  The internees were primarily from the area of Eastern Europe that is now (or was until recently) Ukraine.  War hysteria, as it often does, causes the Canadians to believe that the Ukrainians were a threat and they shipped the men to camps in the wilderness.  The internees built roads, and golf courses.  We passed one of the internment camps, which has a kind of moving memorial.  A lot of the internees never made it back to their families.  Hidden history, but at least a memorial.

Memorial to Ukrainian Internees

 The temperature really never rose about 10 degrees and rain kept up all day but we made good time and made it to Banff shortly after lunchtime.  We stopped at a café downtown and had a nice warm coffee and messed up their floor with drippy water.  

Riding into Banff

Banff is a lot like Lake Louise since it is totally given over to tourism.  There are a few ski areas nearby, and of course the Banff Springs hotel, but not much else.  It is a beautiful setting.  We got to our hotel and were early, so they nicely let us stash Das Bike and change out of our wet gear.  They even gave us bus passes.  So we went up to the hotel.

The Banff Springs hotel is the one that you recognize from all the photos.  The place is very, very cool.  Like the rest of town, it is given over to tourism but it retains its sense of history and the architecture has not been changed over the years (even though the original structure has been expanded several times).  It is a wonderful building but way past our pay grade to stay there.  Better to stay in the cheap dives downtown!

Banff Springs Hotel

Mountains around Banff

Banff is the city in Canada that is at the highest altitude and there are 4 or 5 ski areas nearby.  It is really pretty and they say that tomorrow will be sunny.  We can only hope.

Did I mention that there is a brewery in Banff?

beer...

And that they have poutine?

Poutine...at least it had curds! 

It was nice to have an easy day on the bike.  Tomorrow we head back up the Bow Valley Parkway for a bit, then head west into the Kootenay mountains.  We’re looking forward to leaving the busy towns behind.  It may be a few days before another post -- our next stays are pretty remote.

Also, some of you have mentioned the fire in Glacier National Park.  We are following the situation on a day by day basis and as of right now, the east side of Glacier is a no-go.  That has made us develop some alternative plans and routes, depending upon what happens in the next few days.  The Going-to-the-Sun road, which we hoped to ride, is closed from the east side.  We may have to ride into the US from the west side of Glacier.