May 27th Icefield Parkway

Normally I write what I want and my Dear Bride writes what it should be.  Today is different.  In the words of Pauline.: 
 "We left the motorhome at the CG and took the Honda. It was beautiful--almost warm--and sunny as we started out.  The raw, untamed, truly awesome snowcapped scenery inspired us to do much picture taking, and the sense of beauty was truly overwhelming!  As we passed from the lovely Montagne lifezone (characterized by Aspens, varied shrubbery, and mixed Conifers); and into the Subalpine zone (clumped slender, dwarfed conifers), small clouds were slowly forming, hovering  on the sunny side of the peaks (as you will note in the photos)--this from moist warmed air condensing over the snow.  As we climbed into the Alpine lifezone (no trees) cloudiness increased.  We stopped at the Athabasca Glacier, walked to the glacier as rain and snow began.  Clouds descended, hiding the Columbia Icefield, so with decreasing visability, & increasing cold (even wearing our thermal underwear!), we turned back to the CG.  We had enjoyed the morning traveling a bit over half way along the Icefield Parkway.  The Icefield Centre building had been a big disappontment.  Ignoring the Centre's ubiquitous gift shop and very high priced Cafeteria; we had walked up its snowy steps for nothing, not even a good view through the mist."   

Isn't that nice?  She is smart as well as beautiful.
Now for some photos.

Here is a sign you don't see very often in US.  Unfortunately (perhaps fortunately?), we did not see a one--Caribou that is.  The "70" is in kilometers, and translates to about 43 miles per hour.

Camera at work.

These mountains are called "The Endless Chain"

Tangle Creek

Aspen

We took about 40 fantastic photos of the mountains surrounding the Icefield Parkway.  I cannot show them all.  I wish I could but not enough room.  So I hope you will be satisfied with what you see.

Yes, the mountains all have names.

 

 As you can see the clouds are coming in and reducing the views a little.

This raven walked around us and the car begging in a very loud way.  No fear at all.

This one stayed in the tree and crowed.

I walked down to the river, which is the Athabasca River for a better shot, a  panorama,which I will do when we get back home.  Got a lot of those.

 This is the Athabasca Glacier.  As you may see, it has receded quite a bit over the years as all the glaciers have.

This is a lake from melting ice and Pauline is taking a closeup of just emerging pussy willows. 

 This is the terminal morainne formed since about 1887.  The white spot up near the road is the Icefield Centre Building.

Glacier interpretive sign

Hiker (Pauline) on lateral morainne trail to Glacier

 Pauline on the Athabasca Glacier.

You can see the glacier melting

We went a little further and when we got this picture we decided to turn around and head back to Jasper.

This shows the cloud level and the snow so back we go.

On the way back (in the lower, warmer Montagne Lifezone again) we came to a "wildlife traffic jam"--where idiots park all over the road to see wildlife.  So we parked!   Took this picture of the best part of a bear to see, the back side. 

 It came out a little and I was able to get this (thankfully, Chuck was using his 'zoom' again).  Brown bear or Griz, don't know.

The roadside crowd is saying, "Look this way, bear; do something!  One more picture."

 We will leave you with this panorama.  If you ever have a chance to see the Icefield Parkway, between Banff & Jasper National Parks in Alberta, Canada don't miss it!