The Lake Louise hike in the snow

The first thing I did with the Moose Travel group this morning was to stop at a supermarket in order to buy food for lunch and breakfast tomorrow. After that, we went to several viewpoints around Banff, where we could see the Bow River, Lake Minnewanka and a few other things. While stopping at one of the viewpoints, part of the group managed to get lost and for some reason, they returned from the completely opposite direction, which was really weird. Around noon, we also had lunch at one of the viewpoints. As it was really cold outside, we weren’t able to sit down for our lunch though.

After lunch we drove to Lake Louise. On the way there it started to rain and the rain turned into snow just when we arrived at the Lake. It was extremely cloudy and foggy around here so that we could barely see the lake. Nevertheless, we put on warm clothes and went for a long hike through the snow. We had to walk uphill for more than 1.5 hours, which was extremely exhausting for me. The snow didn’t make it any easier and because of it, we couldn’t even really enjoy the view. In fact, we could barely see anything of the landscape. During the hike, we passed Mirror Lake and a waterfall. The highlight of the hike was supposed to be Lake Agnes but once again we couldn’t even see the surrounding mountains. Nevertheless, it seemed like we were walking through a winter wonderland most of the time so that was kind of nice. There was also a tea house but as we were too many people anyway, we couldn’t rest there. I had hoped for a washroom up there but unfortunately, there was none to be found, which was a bit annoying in my opinion.

Next, we hiked back down, although you couldn’t really call it hiking. Due to all the snow, the ground was so slippery that it felt more like I was more gliding down than walking. It was kind of fun but seemed a little bit dangerous sometimes as well. Thus, I was happy when I finally arrived back at the end of the trail at Lake Louise. By now, I felt really wet even though I had been wearing a waterproof jacket. 

Our next stop was the hostel and I was glad that I could take a hot shower there. After my shower, my room key wasn’t working for some reason (it was an electronic key card). Therefor I had to run to the reception, which was located in a different building, in my shower flip flops – and it was still snowing outside!

After getting back in my room and putting on some decent shoes, I joined the other members of the travel group in the restaurant, where I had a really good elk burger with a salad.

A snowy day in Banff

I woke up because of one of my roommates in the middle of the night - she was apparently sleepwalking. It kind of creeped me out a bit since she was moving around on the floor and making weird noises. As I didn't really know how to handle her, I went to the reception to ask for earbuds and when I told them about what was happening, the girl from the reception came with me to wake the sleepwalker up. When I asked the sleepwalker about the whole thing later today around noon, she didn't remember anything about the whole incident and told me that she had been totally drunk.

When I woke up this morning, it was snowing. After getting ready and eating breakfast, I asked the receptionist about things I could do in and around Banff today. She recommended the Fenland trail, a 2 km hike not too far from here. I decided to try it out and since it was still snowing, I put on several warm layers of clothes.
On the way to the trail, I already realized that my shoes were not really water or rather snow proof. However, I chose to ignore this as I didn't want to turn back.
The trail was a loop through a foresty area. Just when I was about to start the loop, there were two women with two dogs coming from the opposite direction. They told me that they had just seen some fresh bear trails up ahead and that they turned around because of that. While they were telling me about this, I saw a deer standing just a few feet from our location, which was kind of cool. As it was still snowing heavily and there were really no other people around, I reconsidered my path. I really didn't want to run into a bear while hiking on my own.
Consequently, I decided to only walk a small part of the loop and then cross a bridge and walk on another nearby street that was a lot less remote. I followed that street until I could see the first Vermilion Lake, took a few pictures of it and then turned around.
Instead of walking back home, I decided to take the Bow River trail. This way, I could walk right next to the Bow River for a while. At the end of that trail, I could choose between either going back Downtown or following the trail to the Bow River Falls. My feet were definitely wet by now but I didn't want to turn back now since seeing some falls sounded quite promising.
Therefore I kept walking for a bit more than 1 km. In the end, I was happy that I did it - even though the Bow River Falls were not really deep, they were still very impressive.
Afterwards I really felt like I should walk back to the hostel. It was about 2.5 km from the falls and on the way, I still stopped in a few stops. The whole walk had taken me almost 3 hours and it was snowing the whole time.

Back at the hostel, I quickly got out of my wet shoes and socks and put on some really warm socks and shoes so that my feet would warm up.
I spent most of the afternoon just relaxing at the hostel.
Around 4 PM, I went out again and took a walk through the Downtown area. By now it wasn't snowing anymore. On my walk I checked out a few more gift stores and bought an abalone shell ring for myself. I also got a small precookedd meal (pollock and potato salad) at the supermarket before returning to the hostel once again.

Back in my hostel room, I met a new roommate, Sharon, who was actually from Bremen, too. We were both quite surprised about that. Another one of my new roommates, Nadine, was from Germany as well (somewhere close to Frankfurt) and she had planned to join the Moose Travel Tour tomorrow just like me.

From Calgary to Banff and up a mountain

People in Calgary seem to be very chatty. This morning, some old guy called Allen was talking with me for about an hour during breakfast. He was telling me a lot about his family and other stuff, which was interesting.
After breakfast and packing my stuff, I started walking to the Greyhound bus station. I had wanted to walk in order to get some more impressions of Calgary. Now I'd still call it a huge city that has it's beautiful sides. After about a forth of the way, I decided to take the tram for a few stops as walking all the way was getting quite exhausting with my big suitcase.
The transportation in the Downtown area is free, which is really great in my opinion. During my 5 minutes tram ride, some guy in a business suit started talking to me. He was asking what I was doing here in Calgary and where I was from.
After I got off the tram, I tried to walk straight to the bus station but somehow, I got lost twice. First, I tried crossing a big bridge which I really didn't have to cross and then I got lost in a big, fenced parking lot. I arrived at the Greyhound station just in time to pick up my tickets and then I relaxed a bit while waiting for the bus.

The bus ride to Banff didn't seem to take very long. At first the land was flat but as we got closer to Banff, there were first some hills and then later mountains on both sides of the bus. 

On my way to the hostel I discovered a 'Squirrel Street'. Since I was still very focused on anything in connection with 'Supernatural', I got curious if I could also find a 'Moose Street'. In fact, those two streets were even crossing here in Banff, so this seemed kind of cool for me as a 'Supernatural' fan.

Right after arriving at the hostel and leaving my bags there, I left again in order to go to the Banff Gondola. I had to take a bus in order to get to there. 

The gondola ride was quite expensive but I really didn't want to walk all the way up so there wasn't any choice. The gondola brought me to the top of the Sulpher Mountain. There was a 1 km trail to an old weather observatory at Sanson's Peak, the highest point of Sulphur Mountain. Walking that trail was extremely exhausting for me as I just wasn't used to the cold and the thin air up here. Nevertheless, it offered an amazing view of Banff and all of the surrounding mountains. 

Before going back down, I had some beef ribs with beans and roasted potatoes for dinner. It was way too expensive, too, but at least it came with an amazing view.

On the way down, I was all alone in a small gondola, which was almost a bit scary in the beginning because the little gondola was going down very quickly at first. The ride still took quite a while. 

Back down at the base of the mountain, I still had to wait a bit for the bus back to the Downtown area of Banff. I was surprised at how cold it had suddenly gotten. Thus, I was happy when I arrived back at the hostel where I could take a hot shower.

Calgary - the city of lights and rabbits?

Katrina had offered to drive me to the airport today - I just had to join her, Jakki and Jasper on a walk to Elk lake. As a walk seemed to be so much more fun than a 2 hour bus ride to the airport, I happily accepted her offer. It was a beautiful day and thus, I really enjoyed our nice noon walk.

After Katrina had dropped me off at the airport, I wanted to get some snack for lunch. I had decided to try out some chicken salad croissant and potato wedges from Tim Horton. Unfortunately, both items were currently unavailable (I would have had to wait 20 minutes for them). Since this really annoyed me, I went to Starbucks instead and had a tomato and mozarella baguette. Afterwards, I went to the boarding area and waited for my flight.
The plane was extremely small - there were only 19 rows with 4 seats in each row and I was in the last row. Several people actually had some trouble with getting their carry on luggage in the luggage departments. I didn't have to deal with that problem since I only had one really small bag as a carry on. The fight itself was quite uneventful and we landed after a bit less than 1.5 hours in Calgary.

While landing, I really got the impression that Calgary (or at least the greater Calgary area?) was huge. There were blocks of houses in every direction.
On my way from the airport to Downtown Calgary, I felt like I was in a very bare and grey area. There were just so many barren fields and plain looking houses, which didn't really give me a good first impression of Calgary. It got a little better when I arrived in the Downtown area. However, there were so many construction sites that it still didn't seem very appealing. Due to some of the construction sites, I actually had to take a detour to the hostel but at least I got to see a bit of the area this way. Just before arriving at the hostel, I spotted two huge rabbits just at the side of the road.

As soon as I arrived in my room at the HI hostel, I met one of my roommates, Grace. She had some leftover pizza that she offered to share with me. As I didn't have any other real plans and free pizza sounded very good, I joined her in the kitchen. She mentioned that she had just done a tour to Victoria, Vancouver, Banff, Lake Louise and Jasper and then she told me a little about some of her hiking trips and funny experiences with her tour guide along the way.

After eating, I decided to go out again in order take a night walk in Calgary. First, I put on some warm clothes as it was just around 3° C, which seemed pretty cold compared to the 15 ° C I had had in Victoria this afternoon. My evening walk was just beautiful. I went to an illuminated bridge and from there, I had an amazing view of the city. The bridge offered a connection to the tiny St Patrick's Island in the middle of the Bow River and I walked a bit around that island. From here, I could take a few more amazing pictures of the city lights. Afterwards, I walked back to the hostel as it was already past 9 PM. On the way there, I actually saw another big rabbit.

Packing for the Rockies

My long shift at the gift store today wasn't very exciting. I mostly just dusted shelves and spent a lot of time pulling out t-shirts that we had too many of. Ater work, I decided to eat dinner at Mc Donalds since I still had some coupons and in addition to that, I barely had anything to eat at home. I ended up eating a Big Mac menu and afterwards two Mc Flurries. The new chocolate fudge brownie Mc Flurry was really good! However, I was actually freezing when I was done with the ice cream as today was definitely not a warm day.
At home, I spent most of my evening packing for my trip to Banff. I had heard that there had been snow a few days ago so I definitely needed a lot of warm clothes...

The restock marathon at work

When I got up this morning, it looked very foggy outside. By the time I left the house, the sky looked a lot niver, though. However, on my way to work I could see that the sky was very grey on the other side of the harbour, which looked kind of ominous.

I was extremely busy at work today. Before lunch, I had to restock pretty much everything - softgoods (t-shirts, hoodies, sweaters, hats), hardgoods (cups, pens, toys, ...), keychains, magnets and food (cookies, tea, candy). I never had to restock all of these different kind of items in one day so it was a bit stressful. After lunch, I had to check all of the size bubbles of the hanging items in the store on the Royal side. I just barely managed to get all of this done in time.
It just started to rain a few minutes before my work shift was over, which was a bit annoying. Nevertheless, I managed to quickly catch a bus home, so it wasn't too bad.

I spent the evening watching 'Suits' and eating popcorn and ketchup chips with Katrina again.

Hatley Castle

After getting up early in order to take a shower and do some laundry, I finally managed to go to Hatley Castle today. Xue joined me, which was really cool since I hadn't seen her for way too long.
I had thought that there would be a guided tour of the grounds and of the mansion today. Unfortunately, there weren't any tours anymore due to the summer season being over. I was a bit disappointed by that. Nevertheless, just walking through the Hatley Park with Xue was really fun. We had a small picnic and walked through the Japanese and Italian Gardens as well as to a nice lake and several green houses. After we had seen everything the park had to offer, we walked to the nearby ocean. Then we checked out the castle from the outside.
Next we discovered a nice pathway that led us through a beautiful forest. The huge trees and all of the plants around us seemed just so powerful. It made me feel awestruck and like being part of something big. While walking, we tried to make as little sound as possible in order not to disturb the calm of this forest.
Before taking a bus back to Victoria, we made a stop at a cafeteria where Xue had a tea and I had a hot chocolate and a chocolate banana bread. We sat down and relaxed there for a bit. I discovered the quote 'When one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of the world' written on one of the walls in the cafeteria. I really liked this quote as it reminded me of the feeling I had in the forest, that everything is connected.

On the way back home, I felt a little bit melacholic just thinking about leaving this beautiful place soon and maybe never seeing Xue and some other people here again. I figured this feeling had something to do with the song 'Pompeii' which had been stuck in my head all day long...

"And the walls kept tumbling down

In the city that we love

Great clouds roll over the hills

Bringing darkness from above

 

But if you close your eyes,

Does it almost feel like

Nothing changed at all?

And if you close your eyes,

Does it almost feel like

You've been here before?

How am I gonna be an optimist about this?

How am I gonna be an optimist about this?"

Later in the evening, I watched the animated movie 'Hotel Transylvania' with Margo and Tuulia. It was really funny and just adorable.