Johnston Canyon and Lake Louise
Trip Start
Feb 16, 2011
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Trip End
Jun 11, 2012
Lake Louise, Alberta, Canada
Friday, February 3, 2012
On Thursday the plan was to rent a car and go see the ice sculptures up at Lake Louise, but luckily we managed to borrow a car from a friend of a friend. So Christian, Adam, Steffie and I drove west up the Trans-Canada Highway towards Lake Louise. We turned off onto the Bow Valley Parkway and travelled up to Johnston Canyon which Adam had seen the previous week and told us it was good to see.
The weather was still warmish so we didn't need gloves and although I had been to Johnston Canyon several times before, it was much different this time around. I had expected the river to be completely frozen, but the zero degree temperatures had melted some sections into small pools. It was pretty spectacular to see all the frozen water and the lower falls looked amazing. We continued walking up to the upper falls and on the way stopped to climb down to the middle falls. In the autumn, we were able to walk up and under the falls, but now we were able to actually climb on them and there was a ice cave that had formed behind the waterfall. It was such a bizarre, but breathtaking sight which was really unforgetable.
Finally we reached the upper falls and saw a giant sheet of ice that was being tackled by some ice climbers. The Upper falls itself was completely frozen and very pretty. We walked up to the top of the Upper Falls before turning back towards to the car. On the way back I managed to slip over, but thankfully I only had a bruised ego! We weren't wearing crampons, but for the most part the trail wasn't too bad.
We drove onto Lake Louise village for lunch at a bakery where I had a turkey pie, a peanut butter choc chip cookie and a hot chocolate. Next we drove up to the lake where all the ice sculptures were positioned on the shoreline between the lake and the chateau. The lake itself was completely frozen with two ice rinks and an ice castle built on the shoreline. It was very pretty and definitely a memorable sight. We walked around the scultures which had started to melt and some were missing arms, but impressive nonetheless. The lake was easy to walk on and we even found an ice bar, although it wasn't serving drinks.
I definitely wouldn't be able to do this in Australia!
