We woke up to a blanket of snow – our first real snowfall and it’s only Sept 6th. After a warm breakfast and a hot chocolate, we set out for Parker Ridge – a small day hike we were planning on tackling. Within the first few turns of the hike, we bumped into a lovely couple that were enjoying the snowy “Christmas Trees”. Turns out Lionel and Elmara were from South Africa and do not see the snow so much, so were totally enjoying the white, fluffy stuff. After parting ways, we climbed to the saddle of the ridge, then up a little higher to enjoy a brisk view of Mt Athabasca and the Saskatchewan Glacier. On our way down to the saddle, we were delighted to see Lionel and Elmara at had managed to make the trek all the way up there. We invited them for hot chocolate at our car after the hike which they said was too good to pass up. They headed on their way up the Icefields, hostelling all the way, and we plan to visit them in Capetown, SA later in our trip.
We were on a roll, so attempted another hike for the late afternoon. This time up Wilcox Pass to get a different view of the Athabasca Glacier. Very cool views across the valley with the Icefields centre in the foreground and massive glacier behind and above. In this final picture you can see a few dots on the glacier bottom right - these are monster 6x6 tourist buses that explore the glacier. Both Michelle and I had done some glacier walking in New Zealand, so decided that would probably be the more adventurous of the trips, so stuck with our hiking rather than spending the $$ here. We did see some big horn sheep at the top of Wilcox, but only at a distance.
Our final ‘hike’ of the day was a very chilly walk to the toe of the glacier. The thing is massive, and they say at the deepest point, it is actually thicker than the Eiffel Tower is high!! *Stub
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