Wilcox Pass Trail in the Canadian Rockies
Posted: January 18, 2013 Filed under: Canadian Rockies | Tags: Alberta, Canada, Canadian Rockies, forests, Icefields Parkway, meadows, mountains, nature, Rockies, Rocky Mountains, Wilcox Pass Trail Leave a comment
View from the Wilcox Pass Trail, Canadian Rockies, Sept. 2012
I’ve been thinking again about my time in the Canadian Rockies this past September. One of our favourite trails was the Wilcox Pass Trail off the Icefields Parkway, just south of the Columbia Icefield. We only had time to walk the start of it—an hour and a half in total— because we had a long drive ahead of us. Someday we’d love to return and hike the entire trail.
From the Wilcox Pass Trail, Jasper National Park, Sept. 2012
The path climbs pretty quickly, through forest, to a ridge where you can look down over the Parkway on one side and up across meadows to mountains on the other. These are wonderful sweeping views of the land.
Wilcox Pass Trail, Alberta, Sept. 2012
We saw several other people out enjoying the day. One we spoke to was a man from Homer, Alaska who told us that this past winter had brought extremely heavy snow to his home. What a contrast with Toronto which, last year, had only a dusting of snow and which, up to now, has had only a few melted inches.
Mountains seen from Wilcox Pass Trail, Canadian Rockies, Sept. 2012
Field, B. C.
Posted: November 3, 2012 Filed under: Animal Life, Canadian Rockies | Tags: B. C., beauty, birds, British Columbia, Canada, Canadian Rockies, Field, magpie, mountains, Rockies, Rocky Mountains, Yoho National Park 2 Comments
Field, British Columbia, Sept. 2012
Back to the Rockies. When we hiked in Yoho National Park, we stayed in Field, B. C. Field is a tiny town of around 100 people on the eastern border of British Columbia with beautiful views of mountains. Our one sighting of a black bear was in Field. We were eating at the Truffle Pig Restaurant one evening (and greatly enjoying our meal) when another patron pointed to a small bear by the railroad tracks. Most of us got up to have a look. The next day, signs were posted that a young bear had been seen searching for food by the tracks, apparently separated from his or her mother. We were cautioned, for the bear’s safety and our own, not to approach the bear if we saw it again.
The Truffle Pig Restaurant in Field, B. C., September 2012
Mountain seen from Field B. C., Sept. 2012
Mountain seen in Field B.C., Sept. 2012
Field is on one side of railroad tracks. Directly on the other is the National Park Office which we went to several times to check on conditions before hiking. We heard about the Burgess Shale fossil finds for the first time at the Park Office. And this was, in part, responsible for my interest in the ancient history of the land. I’ll come back to this in a future post. In the National Park Office’s parking lot, we encountered many magpies walking about, likely also in search of food. Though magpies are common in the Rockies, we had never seen these birds before our trip and, to us, they were beautiful.
Magpie in the Yoho National Park Office’s Parking lot in Field, B.C., Sept. 2012
During our time in Field, the temperature fell to highs of 8 degrees Celsius with clouds and showers. But, after bundling up, we enjoyed our hikes to Wapta Falls and Emerald Lake which I’ll also tell you about in future posts.
Mountains seen from Field B. C. in Sept. 2012.
How Lake Louise & Johnston Canyon Came to Be
Posted: October 18, 2012 Filed under: Canadian Rockies, Mineral World, Water | Tags: Alberta, Banff National Park, beauty, Canada, Canadian Rockies, glaciers, human ancestors, Johnston Canyon, Lake Louise, Mineral World, mountain glaciers, mountains, mt victoria, nature, Plain of Six Glaciers, rock flour, Rockies, Rocky Mountains, science, tarn, victoria glacier 2 Comments
Lake Louise seen from the Plain of Six Glaciers Trail, Sept. 2012
I’ve mentioned before that being in the Rockies awakened in me an interest in geology and earth history. As I travelled, I wanted to learn how the mountains, lakes and canyons were formed. Here’s a small bit of what I’ve gathered about Lake Louise and Johnston Canyon.
Johnston Canyon, Banff National Park, September 2012
Lake Louise, Sept. 2012, Alberta, Canada
Near the end of our travels, I bought a book to help in my learning called How Old is that Mountain by Chris Yorath. From that book I’ve learned that Lake Louise may be a tarn. And for those of you who have never heard of a tarn, as I had not until a short while ago, it’s a lake that has formed at the base of a steeply walled recess—shaped like a deep bowl—on the side of a mountain. These deep recesses are called cirques and are formed by mountain glaciers eroding the mountain’s rock.
In the case of Lake Louise, it’s possible that when the glacier on Mt. Victoria was much larger it carved Lake Louise’s basin. This may have happened around 25,000 years ago.
Glacier Above Lake Louise, Sept. 2012–I believe this is Mt. Victoria Glacier
Here, the huge lengths of time geology deals with need to be put in terms that our minds can comprehend. In geological terms, 25,000 years ago is very recent. For example, scientists estimate that the earth was formed around four and a half billion years ago and that our human ancestors arrived around 3 million years ago.
To help us, Chris Yorath includes the following analogy. If we imagine the entire history of the earth as a 24 hour clock, the creation of the planet would be at midnight—00:00. And the appearance of humans would not be until well past 23:00 hours, at one minute and a few seconds before the following midnight. This has certainly given me pause for reflection and helps me grasp that Lake Louise was formed in recent times.
Fine particles of sediment called rock flour at the edge of Lake Louise, Sept. 2012
Back to her now. I learned, from information in Banff National Park that the beautiful green blue of Lake Louise and other Rocky Mountain lakes arises in large part from rock flour. That is, from fine particles of sediment washing down from the mountains into the lake. This was visible to us at the end of the lake closest to the Plain of Six Glaciers hike.
In the case of Johnston Canyon, Yorath reports that according to Parks Canada the canyon was created around 8,000 years ago. At that time, a landslide that brought masses of rock down from a nearby mountain diverted Johnston Creek from its path. Then, over time, the canyon, which is 200 metres deep, was carved out.
Looking down into Johnston Canyon in Banff National Park, September 2012
I alternate between contemplating geological and human time scales. Either way, while I was in the presence of the mountains, lakes and canyons, I felt something very old, compared to my life, surrounding me. Being part of nature in that way, experiencing that sense of time and change, was life giving. Because of that, I hope to always draw on the memories of my time in the Rockies and to return to them again.
of humans and nature 
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