13th July 2016 - Athabasca Glacier AB - Kms to date 4170

Kms today 134

It was dry when we left Lake Louise but it soon turned wet again. At least we didn't have to deal with truck traffic as it is banned on the Iceland Parkway.  The temperature soon dropped to 5 degrees C as we climbed up into the Rockies. The weather did break occasionally giving us glimpses of the magnificence of the mountains.  We climbed up to the Sunwapta Pass (2,030 m) and the rain stopped long enough for us to take a few photos of the N Saskatchewan River valley below us. This river flows to the Atlantic but over the pass the Athabasca River flows to Hudson Bay. My hands were getting cold so I put my gloves on the warm cylinders of Alan's bike.
We arrived at the Glacier View hotel at 12 mid-day to find the placed packed with tourists waiting to take a tour over the glacier in a huge bus. When Mum and I came here in 1964 we went up on the glacier on a tracked snowmobile an example of which was on display outside the hotel.

Alan posing in front of the vehicle that Colin and Mum rode in 1964.

We checked in and then had some lunch. The crowds got worse so we decided to give the bus trip a miss and walk up to the toe of the glacier instead. We got to within 200m of the ice and could see the huge high lateral moraine banks on either side. These indicated how deep the glacier had been in the past, but of course it had retreated a long way since then. Just then a group of walkers appeared and we realised that they were a guided tour and were going to walk up onto the ice. They were carrying crampons to put on their shoes. That would have been worth doing. After we got back to the hotel we went up onto the balcony and it certainly lived up to its name Glacier View.

Colin on the balcony of our hotel with the Athabasca Glacier in the background.

After dinner in the restaurant the weather turned very wet so we spent the evening catching up on the blog.