Our Trip to Banff (Part 3)- Rain and Snow and All Points Between

We knew we wanted to take a gondola up a mountain sometime during our trip in Banff, it was just a matter of when and where. There are major gondolas in Jasper and Banff and we discovered one in Lake Louise, too. Now, all my long-term weather forecasts suggested that we might see more rain late in our trip so it seemed to make sense to book the gondola earlier in Jasper. Everything I had read had said don't do the gondola on an overcast or rainy day as the visibility can't compare to a sunny day. So we had crossed our fingers when we had bought tickets on the first gondola up the mountain on Thursday morning.

And then we woke up to rain. And grey, overcast skies. I was incredibly, bitterly disappointed, still the tickets were already bought and it was still an adventure, so off we went to the Tramway.

The picture above was actually taken on Wednesday afternoon when we went to buy the tickets. See? Clear skies. By the next morning, not so much. So huddled in our sweatshirts with three or four other hearty tourists we boarded the first gondola of the day and headed up the mountain. Here's the view we saw most of the way up:

Yeah :). You can kind of see the Athabaska River down there and beyond it the town of Jasper. Surprisingly, though, by the time we were going up in the gondola we were in good spirits about it all and taking the wet adventure in stride. We were still going up to the top of one of the Rocky Mountains! Our tour guide was fun and she and John told jokes back and forth.

The visibility at the top of the mountain was absolutely nil, white as far as the eye could see and actually it was pretty cool. The whole atmosphere has this misty, other-worldly feel to it, like we had drifted into some kind of fantasy novel. We had breakfast in the chalet and watched the mist from out the window and then braved outside long enough to go on the short boardwalk around the top of the mountain.

That's the tramway/restaurant behind John there. We were the only ones who risked the trail while we were there, but, hey, we had to say we did it, right?

It turned out our very friendly tour guide on the way down the mountain was from Toronto! She told us she was spending the summer in Alberta and working at the Tramway. Awesome summer job.

At the bottom of the mountain we headed  south onto Highway 93 with our next hotel being in Lake Louise. Highway 93 from Jasper to Lake Louise is also known as the Icefields Parkway and has a reputation for being one of the most scenic highways in the world. And it was. Along the entire 200 km. there was an endless display of mountains, gorgeous turquoise lakes, small waterfalls and rivers that were just stunning to look at.

We had two stops planned on our way to Lake Louise and the first of them was Athabaska Falls. Flowing off the Athabaska River, it's one of the biggest and most powerful falls in the Banff area.

Luckily, by the time we hit the Athabaska Falls the weather was starting to clear up, too, which would become typical in the mountains. The weather could change on a dime- sometimes it would start to rain on the road and a kilometre down it would be blue and sunny. We learned to roll with the weather punches.  Athabaska Falls were very pretty with craggy rocks and sea-green opaque water. There were walkways above and below the falls and viewpoints out over the Athabaska River.

Then we headed back south along the Icefields Parkway toward the Columbia Icefields Glacier Adventure. And that's where we'll pick up next time.

You can see the rest of my photos in Jasper National Park here: Jasper National Park