Day 4

Layered massifs near Canmore Alberta

Roger's Pass , Alberta

Day 4

Got off at 7:30 AM; some kind of a record! The day is new and bright, the hills are chevron textured evergreen and have never been logged.  The roads are quiet and morning sun drenched and empty save for a lone biker or two.  I watch with envy and wonder to the next time I too can bike this far away.

We drove to Nakusp, wified at a cafe, then its back northward to Revelstoke and Banff.

The road from Revelstoke to Banff, Canada Highway 1, is under a lot of construction with work seemingly moving southwards from Banff.  It will soon be  a scenic wide 4 lane with bike paths all along the Provincial Park sections. Pedestrian overpasses are designed as double arches, one over each two lanes with gigantic granite boulders buttressing the ends and the centers at the dividing median. These boulders are landscaped in the alpine greenery style with shrubs and mountain firs.  In some cases the entire upper area of the overpass itself is completely planted with firs and more boulders giving the impression of a forest band arching over the freeway, quite handsome.

Canmore Park S. of Banff Alberta

On the road between R & B somewhere around Roger’s Pass the Canadian Rockies begin thrusting upward.  There is so much room here that these 10,000 ft high mountains seem each unto themselves standing alone all the better spotlighted for viewing and study.  Eyes pop and jaws drop with such regularity with no moments of “Ho hum” around the next sweeping bend.  Broad is the word that keeps coming to mind.  A broad and muscled Rockies with spaces in between the moon could fit into.

We pulled into Spring Creek Mountain Village Campgrounds at Canmore just beyond Banff surrounded by a cirque of granite peaks an evening sky with streaks the color of persimmon and a rising moon sitting atop a tabletop mountain.  There is a quiet creek behind the airstream, wild rabbits and later discovered from bed, train tracks on the other side of the creek. Thankfully no midnight whistles.