SKI-ing across the pond on 4 wheels

Wednesday, 9 September 2009

Columbia Icefield

Travelling south from Jasper for about 60 miles along the Icefields Parkway there is no permanent habitation until you arrive at the Columbia Icefield centre.
The centre is an information office and hotel. The carpark acts as an "overflow" campground where for $10.80 a night you can park up with an excellent view of the glaciers.
What you do not realise at first is the vast scale of the glaciers and the fact that they are several miles away.

This is Sunwapta Falls on the way to the Columbia Icefield.

At the bottom left of the picture is an icebus. These are hugh vehicles about 60ft long and 20ft high that take tours out onto the surface of the Athabasca Glacier.

The Columbia Icefield is the largest area of ice south of the Arctic Circle and feeds rivers that flow into the Pacific, Atlantic and Actic circles.

To the north of the Athabasca Glacier is the dome Glacier. The thin layer of snow along the top of the mountain is actually over 100ft thick.

Ice on the glacier is 300ft thick takes about 120years to slide from the top of the mountain to the foot of the glacier where it melts.

The south area of the Glacier. The surface has a polished silver appearance, in other areas it has a distinct blue tinge due to the filtering effect of the ice on sunlight.

Looking up the Glacier from near the foot. At the Icefield Centre it was a warm sunny morning. At the foot of the Glacier an icy wind blows strongly
as the air is cooled by the melting ice. There are caves and canyons in the ice, making it unsafe for the public to walk on.

The foot is covered with dust and stones giving it a very dirty appearance.

The Maligne Valley (south-east of Jasper)

A day trip along the Maligne Valley lead us to Lake Maligne. We did the tourist thing and went on a boat ride part way along the lake.

Spirit Island in Lake Maligne

South end of the Lake where you can only visit by pedel power. There is a campgound - but a 14 mile canoe trip each way was a bit too far to take the motorhome.

The road along the Maligne Valley shows how the rocks have been forced almost vertically out of the ground along the continental divide. These rocks were originally the seabed and horizontal.

The Maligne Canyon contains a series of falls over about 5 miles. In places the canyon is a little as a couple of feet wide at the top and 150ft deep.

Jasper Area

Lake Edith just outside Jasper town. A pleasant afternoon was lazed away in the sunshine.

Atabasca Falls on the Icefields Parkway south of Jasper. Even at 10am the falls area was crowded with visitors.

Around a quarter of a mile upstream of the falls and nobody else in sight.

Horseshoe lake south of Jasper.

Tree floating on horseshoe lake. The water really looked that blue (if you turn the picture upside down it looks like a very impressive toss of the caber!!)