Rocky Mountaineer

Sunday 8 June
Up again at 6.00 as we have to have our bags out by 6.45 to be picked up and taken to the train station across the road.  Bring one to follow instructions I do as we are instructed.  We are not having breakfast this morning, breakfast is provided on the train.  Anyway, with all our luggage gone and nothing inspiring on TV we decided to go downstairs.  Down there we find our bags & the RM representative, who checks us in - i.e. gives us a boarding pass and tags our bags.  She tells us to go across the road to the station and wait for boarding at 8.10.  Our bags are being taken care of and will be in Kamloops when we arrive this afternoon. 

Well, that is the plan, but as we found out shortly after leaving Jasper, plans do not always work out.  A once in a decade event has just taken place and there is a slip ( they call it a mudslide) on the road between Jasper and Kamloops.  So what? We are on as train.  Ah ha that is the problem, because RM plans to be super efficient and have luggage in room before we arrive, the luggage all goes by truck!  The news is that because trucks can't go through National Parks, the only way to get to Kamloops is via Calgary - a long, long way - about a 12 hour drive instead of 6.  End of story our bags should arrive about 10.00 pm.  Just in time to be reloaded for the onward journey to Vancouver.  The funny thing is that this only affects Gold & Silver passengers, as Red class were required to pack an overnight as their luggage was never going to be available in Kamloops!

Sooo, while we wait we decided to explore Kamloops and armed with a map we headed down to the river.  The good news is that the temperature was 27 this afternoon and a bit breezy. Pleasant conditions and enjoyable walk shared with English couple from Battle, who were part of our original 18.  On our way back met up with Christine & Peter from Timaru, talking with our Adelaide friends and we were then joined by another English couple from our train coach.  All in all quite a gathering.  Walked back to our hotel with Christine & Peter and had another hilarious meal with them.  The restaurant would have done Fawlty Towers proud.  A good cheap meal as we were not hungry after all the food on the train.

The trip from Jasper was a disappointment in some ways, as most of us had an expectation of snow covered peaks etc. somewhat similar to what we had seen from the coaches on our various trips.  This was not the case and really all we saw were more and more trees PLUS another bear!!!!  The food and hospitality has been great and I really think that we have to accept that the Rockies as such are all over  after Jasper and this is just a trip back to Vancouver, with sights as a bonus.  Christine & Peter confirmed that their view from Gold Class is no better - just higher priced trees ☺

Just to touch on yesterday, beautiful day again, great tour but ABC. We seem to have moved into canyon country now.  Saw some lovely lakes early in the morning before the breeze got up.  At one lake we got trapped in a wedding party at 10.00 in the morning.  There was a long causeway and the bridal party started at one end just before we arrived to cross back to our bus.  We didn't stay for the reception though.  Saw another black bear just down by the river, but he wandered behind a bush before we could get a photo.  Just a half day tour, so had the afternoon to wander, but after a long lunch with Christine & Peter, we wandered back to our hotel, waylaid by Led (92) & his daughter Christine from England, so very social afternoon.  Watched our train arrive in anticipation of the morning, had a spa on the roof of our hotel and had dinner at the same restaurant we had lunch and dinner in the previous night.  Great salmon!

Well we are fed & watered and it is currently 10.30, with no sign of our cases. The issue is now whether to just go to bed in undies and get some sleep or keep waiting.  Given that we have to be downstairs for our shuttle at 7.15 tomorrow, I think 11.00 will be our cutoff point.  So here we are, sitting, waiting, wondering.  Ah, tomorrow is another day and a new set of adventures as we arrive back in Vancouver.

Latest update - 10.45  1 out of 3 bags delivered, so at least we have nightwear!

Explanation of photos in the last post

For some reason my blogging programme decided to take time off and went into a loop every time I tried to add narrative.  So, from memory:

1. Main Street Banff
2. Emerald Lake
3. Lake Louise
4. Lake Louise this morning (note the fresh ice)
5. Athabasca Glacier
6. Our "Bus" driver lending a hand
7. The black bear
8. Typical woodlands
9. Columbia Icefields (should have been between 5 & 6).

Hopefully the next post will go back to normal. 

It is currently 11.00 pm Friday night & still quite bright outside - we are expecting 0 degrees overnight and another beautiful day tomorrow.

It snowed!

Thursday 5th
Woke to find that the temperature had plummeted and was sitting on 1 or 2 degrees.  Apparently it rained last night, but we didn't hear a thing.  Clearly however it had snowed at high altitudes and it was good to see some fresh dusting on the higher peaks.  I must now apologise for my comments about lack of snow cover😩. Our drive today was to the Yoho National Park & then to Lake Louise ( by lunchtime).  As we reached a higher altitude, fresh snow was evident and made the real Rockies spectacular.  Apparently there is some debate as to where they start - some say back where we did the helicopter flight yesterday, while others say the start of the National Park.  What we also established is that helicopters are prohibited from all National Parks, which is why we could only fly in adjacent foothills.  All things are explained... eventually!

Our trip took us out of the province of Alberta into British Columbia and the Yoho park and then back to Alberta for Lake Louise.  The defining thing is that water flows east on the Bow River, from Lake Louise and after that the waters flow through BC to the west. At Jasper, waters flow north to the Arctic.  So we are very much travelling the great divide.

Good news - We saw a BEAR, a grizzly grazing beside the main road.  The driver stopped and the bear just ignored us (OK it was behind the animal fence running along the highway).  Unfortunately it was a bit far away for decent photos.  In the Yoho National Park we saw water. Picturesque, postcard material.  Before that we stopped at the historic railway spiral, where the trains go back on themselves threefold.  All goof and back on the bus, when the driver says "here comes a train" so out we all traipse.  It actually takes a good 5 minutes to reach the spiral part we are watching, having already completed a 180 degree turn under the highway.  Probably hard to put this in words, but imagine a train over 1.5 kilometres long (2 locos in front, 1 in the middle and another one at the rear) travelling to the right, then reappearing travelling away from you into a tunnel, reappearing on the right from another tunnel and heading away - all visible at the same time.  Great engineering & of course much bigger than our Rarimu Spiral.

We arrived at Lake Louise about 1.00 and are staying in this magnificent château type hotel.  Very, very expensive and no free internet, hence this post will have to wait!!!!!  All that aside, a most awe inspiring sight, with frozen lake, towering mountains and everything I had imagined.  We arrived in sun, it started snowing just a tad, sun came out, went in, came out (getting the picture?) and then snowed quite heavily for a while.  Couldn't be more perfect as we sat and ate and later drank with this vista. It is supposed to be -3 overnight, so am looking forward to the morning.

Friday 6 June
Well, it lived up to expectation and while it did snow somewhat higher up, nothing settled around the hotel, but it was cold enough to refreeze that part of the lake that had thawed yesterday.  The sun was out, not a cloud in the sky - perfection.

We had a great drive heading to Jasper, & while we saw numerous (ABG, rather than the usual ABC we experience in Europe) glaciers and had a full description of what and where etc.  The highlight however was the Ice Explorer on the Athabasca Glacier.  We went up onto the glacier in these special buses, which cost $1.5m and all but one in the world are on this glacier - I think it is 20+.  The only other one is at McMurdo Base.  Hugh wheels and they are needed to traverse the ice and one of the slopes down/up the Moraine is the steepest commercial roadway in the world.  Just as well it was in all wheel traction mode.  Our driver on this machine was a young girl from Brisbane.  Once again a great experience and more importantly, used our Kathmandu jackets & shoes, although it was actually colder at the Cafe downhill.  Funnily, although we seemed quite a long way up the glacier, we were probably only a third of the way.

Some more waterfalls and we headed off to Jasper, our driver turned off his commentary so people could rest/sleep.  After 3/4 hour the bus comes to as sudden halt and sure enough there is a black bear grazing on the side of the road.  He backed up the bus, so got a reasonable photo.  The bear got tired of the attention and wandered behind a bush.  The driver said that the bear was about 3 years old and clearly it had recently kicked out of home ( which apparently happens after 2 years - Mum just gets tired of them and is looking for more fun with a new "husband"!!).  I am pretty sure that the grizzly we saw yesterday was in the same boat.

Got into Jasper just before 6.00 and we have a cute hotel opposite the train station, in the centre of town.  We are very fortunate as the group (which has grown to 36) are spread over numerous hotels, many are miles out of town.  Great to have WiFi again and also we haver 2 days here, with a city tour tomorrow morning.  At least it is not too early and we don't have to pack our bags before breakfast.  One of the annoying things about conducted tours - not complaining however, just commenting.

Rockies for real

Wednesday 4th
It is after dinner and I am settling down for the night, but want to record our day today. BUT as usual I will mention our last day in Calgary first.  We did the Calgary Tower fairly early in the morning, before the haze (or any rain) set in.  Had great views all the way to the Rockies on one side and then out to the endless prairies to the east.  Because of all the high rise buildings, one could not describe the view as "awesome", but it was still worth the visit.

Because we now know the city so well, we wandered down to the water & then back to the Devonian Gardens on the 4th floor off the mall.  We established that the pianist we saw yesterday was just a random player, as the piano is a public asset and anyone can perform anything whenever!  The gardeners were in full activity pruning the shrubs with nail scissors - I jest, but at the speed of what they were doing, this would be a job for life.  After lunch we ventured into the Skyway and by miracles  actually made it back to our hotel on the first attempt.  Packing was the order of the day when we got to our room.

OK, so this morning we boarded our coach for day 1 of our travel package.  There are only 18 of us, 2 other Kiwis, 4 Aussies and the rest UK - No Americans.  We travel west towards Banff and stop about halfway there for our 12 minute helicopter ride.  It was both short and although it gave a good overview of the eastern side of part of the Rockies range, it was not as impressive as the flight we did at Mt Cook 20 odd years ago.  It was interesting how much the snow had melted since we flew in on Saturday and it was possibly the lack of snow which partially detracted from the experience.  We were in a 6 seated helicopter, so all in all we were there for about an hour.  All the surrounding land is owned by First Nations people (think that our driver was one as he was insistent that Indians came from India!).  Anyway, they had a Casino on site as well but he said that they were getting smarter and just owned the Casino and had someone else operating it.

Onwards and around a lovely lake (so many that I have forgotten the name) where apart from the beauty we saw horned sheep & Elks.  Later we saw a couple of deer a well.  In fact we saw 3, the last one was running up the main street of Banff as we were eating dinner.  No, venison was not on the menu.  By middayish we reached Banff and had lunch.  It is a little expensive here. A sandwiching was $7.95.  One good thing was that they were very nice and a simple sandwich  is something we have been missing over the last week.  After lunch it was backwards & forwards through town and out to the Falls and back to town & back out over the same route to the first hotel site and back again.  OK, not a great fan of city tours.  However we eventually got out of town and up to Sulphur Mountain and the Banff Gondola.  We went up 700m and I am pleased I grabbed my jacket when we're got off the bus as we were well above the remaining snowline.  Mighty views of all the surrounding mountains.

We went both up and back (by coincidence) with a couple from Northern Ireland.  After this expedition, it was back to Banff and our hotel, which is more than adequate, but not quite the suite experience of Calgary.  We are about a kilometre from town, so decided to walk in to get some photos, as we hadn't before as we'd assumed that our hotel would be in the centre.  Just shows that you shouldn't assume anything.  Wandering back we found that the town was suddenly crowded with many buses arriving and perhaps thousands of tourists, mainly Asian walking into town.  Certainly much busiest than it had been at lunchtime or when wee walked in.

Dinner was in the hotel and thankfully there is a Keg Steakhouse in house.  This is a chain and we had one just down from our hotel in Calgary, so we knew that price was reasonable & quality good.  Just a little note though, a tourist town adds an extra dollar or two!!!  Vivian had commented as we came into the restaurant that we'd been to the one in Calgary, so they ran around and got us a window table.  Lovely. 

There were an Asian couple sitting adjacent and it wasn't until the end of the meal when I made a comment about the Australian flag flying and no NZ one, when they said that they had lived in Christchurch for 10 years, but had now returned to Singapore.  Just surprising who you meet.  They have just about finished their tour and are on a Princess cruise on Saturday.   Everyone, both on our tour and just generally are very friendly and enjoying the experience.  We look forward to tomorrow & Lake Louise.  We will have a different driver tomorrow, as the whole Rockies thing is so segmented and people do their own mix & mingle.  Today's driver was surprised that we were all doing the same complete tour.  Who knows, tomorrow our little band of travellers may increase.  Oh, forgot to mention that at the top of the Gondola we also saw a very tame/hungry Squirrel.  Vivian is still holding out for bears, although she is certain she saw one just after the Elks.  No photo: It didn't happen I say.  Tomorrow is another adventure.

In the air

Up high

Horny sheep

Elk grazing

Down to Banff

Top of the gondola, by the NZ emblem, showing the way home!

Calgary in summer

Well we didn't think much of Seattle's airport - it was filthy everywhere, but thankfully it was only just over an hour and yes the temperature was in the mid 20s, a vast improvement on our departure from Anchorage.  We were impressed however that we did not have to go through any security screening and were soon about our plane for the flight to Calgary.  Vivian is still panicking about our bags!!   The flight is actually just over an hour and a half (I had overlooked the time change as we are going to Alberta).   Had a great flight and some more magnificent views over the mountain tops which were covered in snow.   About 20 minutes away from Calgary we ran into some heavy cloud and we started circling over the mountains (great views still) and the Captain comes on to say the airport is currently closed due to thunderstorms, but that we should be clear in about 15 minutes.  So we continue our scenic flight and then down the plains and around the suburbs of Calgary before our approach to the airport.  Calgary looks very new and clean from the air, with lots of subdivisions spreading out from the city.  Most of the houses are smaller multistory ones in small blocks.  Some lifestyle type homes also abound, many 3 storied.

No problems in landing and going through immigration, although the girl we struck could do with a personality transplant.  I mean we say we are only staying in Canada for a fortnight and are doing the Rockies, so why does it matter whether we came from Seattle or Anchorage - they are both USA!  Got a shuttle to our hotel and when we got to our room we were pleasantly surprised to see we had a suite, a view & a balcony☺

After unpacking we thought it was time for a meal as we hadn't really eaten all day, so enquired at the desk and were recommended the steakhouse down 1 block.  The 4th Avenue location is very much downtown business area, with little in the way of cafe's etc, which seems to be a common thread on this trip.  Anyway, back to dinner, we rock on down and of course it is Saturday night and the place is packed.  We were soon seated and had a most magnificent steak meal, preceded by the biggest shrimps that we had come across.  The added bonus was that the ships were free, as a promotion from the hotel/steakhouse ( don't sneeze at $24).  As we had lost a couple of hours since we left in the morning, we headed to bed, being quite happy that it is now dark at night!

Sunday 1 June
A pleasant surprise was that we now find that breakfast is included, as this wasn't stipulated when we booked.  Our stay is part of the Rocky Mountaineer package and the extra nights part of our free bonus for early booking, so we're just go with the flow.  Back to breakfast, which is served in the basement, had the usual things and was a good apart from the coffee. Tea in future.

Calgary was flooded last June/July and this is still very evident.  Out hotel sub basement was extensively devastated, so the pool and gym etc. are still out of action, although there is a lot of work going on and I believe they plan to have it all completed later in the month for the summer season.  Walked extensively and now have a good understanding of the layout of the place.  We walked over to the (replica) original Fort Calgary and then down and along the Bow river, which along with it's sister the Elbow river, which joins by the Fort was responsible for the floods.  As I have commented, there are many repairs to structures and paths etc. being carried out, but overall the city is great for walkers, joggers and cyclists.  A great network.  Sunday just happened to also be the Calgary Marathon, which is run in a number of events covering different lengths.  Overall there were some 15,000 participants who raised over $1.5m for various charities.  A beautiful morning and was getting very hot by midday.

We continued our walk along the river, looking for a cafe, but still to no avail.  Walked over to Prince's Park Island in the middle of the Bow and found a cafe serving brunch, so decided to do that.  By now it is about 1.30.  We had noted the clouds gathering to the west and the threat of showers but were not to concerned.  No sooner had we left then it rained. BIG spots.  It wasn't cold however, but we did get wet getting back to the hotel.  Lesson learned - it rains every afternoon.  Had dinner in the hotel, which is also downstairs and was in the bar area.  Given that it was Sunday, it was extremely quiet.

Monday 2 June
Slept in and just made breakfast.  Back to walking around again and this time we headed off over the river and walked up the 155 steps to the top overlooking the city.  These stairs are used extensively by the fitness fanatics (mainly young girls) who run up and down numerous times as well as doing other exercises at both top and bottom.  I was exhausted just watching them.  Back down and onto the mainland, we made our way to the Core shopping mall in the middle of town.  Grabbed a coffee & a muffin from a healthy shop, so that should be good for us.  Our main purpose was to visit the gardens on the 4th floor.  After a roundabout experience, we reached these magnificent gardens, situated on one of the overpasses between a couple (or more) buildings.  We'll go back tomorrow and have lunch up there too.  We also found out that the city has a network of inter building walkways called +15 Skywalk - if only wee had known that yesterday, we could have kept dry!  Oh yes, on our way back to the hotel today the rain started, but was only a few spots.  I was much more comfortable in shorts & T-shirt today, so I am still keeping all those winter woolies in the suitcase.  Long may it last.

Southern Rockies

From our room - towards the airport

Canada Geese & families

Overlooking Bow River & city. Towards the Rockies

Top of the stair walk

Garden on the 4th floor

...and again

Calgary calling

Saturday 31 May
We are somewhere over the Gulf of Alaska en route to Seattle and then up to Calgary.  We woke to relatively heavy rain this morning and were pleased that we were off to the airport, rather than sightseeing.  Our hotel provided a free shuttle, so we had to be ready at 7.00, which meant no breakfast until we reached the airport. It was actually worth waiting for and wee enjoyed the fresh cooked meal & endless coffee, which was probably not a good thing given we are on a 3 hour flight (& another 3 hours out of Seattle).

Yesterday was cloudy and a little drizzle, but not enough to put us off walking into town and having ( processed) breakfast.  The coffee was good though.  After that we went back down to the river to check out whether any salmon were running. There were a lot more fishermen as the tide was just off high tide.  The tides here are 30 odd feet, so when we were down yesterday it was a negative low tide.  No salmon to be seen though!, but good exercise.

We took the free trolley back up to town and then the midday sightseeing tour.  After that it WS on to the Museum - which was excellent.  The weather held and by late evening it WS fine.  In fact I took a photo at 10.30 which showed the sin shining on the mountains in the distance, although much of the snow we saw on the first day seems to have gone.

The people of Anchorage are all very friendly and laid back.  We enjoyed them very much.  As I have commented before, the CBD is really pretty small and there is not a lot to see outside of Museums and the like.  One thing did strike us, they are really focused on the 1964 earthquake, possibly because it was the 50th anniversary last month.  We were really unaware of the devastation caused and the changes to the topography - a drop of 22 feet in many places along the fault line.  The quake was a 9.2, which is certainly massive when compared with NZ.  Was most reassured when we were told that they have 100s daily and just last Sunday a 5.6 was felt.  As we were on the 9th floor, I am pleased they did not have a repeat while we were there.  Another useless bit of information was that a quarter of all private aircraft are based in Anchorage and that young people can get their pilot's licence before their drivers!

Safely in Seattle, had the most magnificent views over the mountains on our way down. The sky was so clear and of course we were on the port side to get the view.  Just time for a coffee & muffin for lunch and we are off on a smaller plane to Calgary.  Oh, it is Hot here!!!!!

Anchorage

!Wednesday 28th
So we had elected to do a ship's tour on our way from Whittier to Anchorage.  It is about 80km and an ordinary transfer (you have no alternative) is almost as much as the tour.  I should note that the majority where carrying on to Denali National Park and the lodges owned by Princess.  Others had morning flights out of Anchorage, so that left s relatively small number who either had evening flights, were renting a car or who were staying in Anchorage.  I would have to say with hindsight that this was the best value tour we had taken.  I know it's only money, but ....

We had a full bus of 50 and our driver was a retired music teacher (born etc on Anchorage) and filled us with many stories as well as songs.  To summon us back to the bus he had an antelope horn, which amused others around our various stops. A quick tour of Whittier took 5 minutes, as there is nothing there!  We then queued up to go through the 2 mile tunnel out of Whittier.  This is a combined rail/road tunnel and is one way with defined opening times each way.  Our northbound was scheduled for 9.00 and we only had a 5 minute wait.  Amazing engineering through the mountain with a glacier on top.

Onwards to Portage Visitors Centre, where there was a large blue iceberg parked outside. They assured us that they hadn't towed it from the glacier but it was just natural according to the wind direction.  I forgot to mention that it was cold and wet, the worst day we'd had, but the showers came and went and it was not too bad at the Centre.  However we then moved on to the little (comparatively) boat onto Portage lake and then up to the glacier itself.  Being a small purpose built boat, we were able to get up close.  However the rain & wind chill did not encourage us to stay on the top deck for long.  A great mini cruise and well worth it, which is more than can be said for our next stop at a gift shop (what else) and cafe. Distinct unmemorable 😠

By some chance of confusion or something, some of the passengers convinced our driver that we were supposed to also go to the Wildlife Rescue Centre and after he checked with his office we got the OK.  I won't go into the details other than to say that we were extremely lucky.  Anyway we saw all the wildlife in a semi natural environment.  Vivian was excited yo see both brown & black bears, particularly as they just happened to wander into view for a short time while we were standing there.

Moving on, a 45 minute drive along the foreshore to the airport, where we dropped off half the bus load and then 15 minutes into Anchorage.  Vivian was soooo relieved to see our bags sitting there!  We were all set to walk the 7 or 8 blocks to the hotel, when one of the staff at the Hospitality Centre said that our hotel would pick us up.  Sure enough after a phone call and 10 minute wait, the van arrived and delivered us here.  We're on the 9th floor and have a great view towards the south.  OK, it is a 2* hotel but it has all the services necessary and a good dining room.  It is a little out of town - see above, but after today, there is little benefit in being in the CBD.  But I am ahead of my self again.

Thursday 29th
Had a great sleep and didn't make breakfast until 9.00. Fortunately it is on until 11.00, so no rush.  Another overcast day with temperature around 11 degrees.  Donned our coats and trotted off.  Well Anchorage is a bit of a nothing town.  If you took out all the governmental agencies, there would just be a few hotels.  The hotels to do well, as a large number of cruise ship passengers have a night or so before or after there cruise.  However as I mentioned earlier, Princess and their sister line Holland America, heavily promote their Denali packages.  Back to Anchorage, we walked and walked - even had a hard time finding a cafe.  We are certainly very fortunate in NZ.  Resorted to Starbucks in the end and then headed off to the stream by the railway to see the salmon, which we had been told were running.  We had thought it too early, but we still went and had an extensive walk through the backblocks of the town.  We eventually reached the spot and when talking with 2 lots of fishers, found out that it was low tide and the salmon don't come until high tide.  We were not going to stand there for 6 hours, so walked back to town for a bite to eat.  By now it was after 3.00 and we still could not find any cafes or other eateries.  We did in the end and then came back to the hotel, where at last the blog is completely up to date.