8/16/2008 - Canada: Day 9 (Banff NP)

After a sleepless night (thanks to the transcanadian railroad, which passed behind my site) at Tunnel Mountain Campground outside of Banff, I hit the road early. I quickly found out that Banff was much more crowded with tourists than Jasper ... this soured my experience a bit. Overall, the park was amazing, but did not measure up to what I had witnessed in Jasper. The townsite of Banff is full of rich, pretentitous people and/or tourists, which is the last thing you want to see in a national park. The other townsite in Banff is Lake Louise ... I visited this site, but was so turned off by the hundreds of tourists that I didn't even snap a pic. Why? There were hundreds of other beautiful lakes in these parks without tourists swarming around. If you visit these parks, stear clear of these two townsites unless you really like people watching.

Banff Springs Hotel: architecture imitating nature.

Hwy 1A, or "Bow Valley Parkway".

A black bear berry hunting along the Bow Parkway.

After taking in some of the Banff sites, I headed over to Yoho National Park and the Field townsite. At Yoho I viewed glacier-fed Takakkaw Falls -- one of the highest waterfalls in Canada.



I then took another spur over to Emerald Lake, which lived up to its name.

I'm certain she wore this outfit to scare away the wildlife.

I ended the night overlooking Mount Rundle, Banff townsite, and the Hoodoos (seen in the bottom right-center of the pic) as the moon rose over the Canmore area.