Side Roads Making Contact For a comprehensive package on Alberta, contact Travel Alberta Dept. AOJ 399 P.O. Box 2500 Edmonton, Alberta Canada T5J 4G8 phone: 800-661-8888 www.exploreAlberta.com The three hotels we stayed at are all run by Canadian-Pacific. You can call 800-441-1414 or visit www.CPHotels.com for information on their packages. In the summer there are lots of campgrounds and RV facilities, but this is a popular tourist area and can get crowded. Air Canada operates lots of flights into both Calgary and Edmonton (about three hours from Jasper). Call 800-774-8993 or visit www.aircanada.ca for more information. If you're a skier, you can get piles of information on the Banff/Lake Louise area at www.skibanff.com and www.skibanfflakelouise. com. Marmot Basin area in Jasper has a fine site at www.skimarmot.com. Copyright © 1999 Tim Jones. All rights reserved.

Icefields Parkway, Alberta: The Road To The Top Of The World...  by Tim Jones "The entire length of the Icefields Parkway is contained within two of the grandest national parks I've ever visited -- Banff National Park and Jasper National Park..." A frozen lake in Banff National Park. Ask yourself this: "When was the last time I drove a highway that had a warning sign telling me that the next gas station was over 100 miles ahead; that around the next bend, the wildlife in the road was likely to be bighorn sheep; that the road would be passing the foot of a major glacier, and whiteout conditions were common -- all year!" Haven't done that recently? Then you haven't driven the "Icefields Parkway," Alberta's Route 93 from Lake Louise north to Jasper. Some travel writers have called it "The Most Beautiful Highway In The World." I'm not sure of that, but in 30 years of traveling in some of the most scenic areas of North America, I've never seen anything that would cause me to dispute them, either. The entire length of the Icefields Parkway is contained within two of the grandest national parks I've ever visited -- Banff National Park and Jasper National Park -- contiguous chunks of unspoiled country with mountains all around rising to over 10,000 feet. The tallest of those mountains are Mount Columbia (at 3,747 meters or 12,365 feet the highest point in Alberta) and Mount Robson, which lies just outside the park's boundary (at 3,954 meters or 13,000 feet the highest point in Canada). Canada is very serious about protecting its parks and you see very, very little development along this stretch of road. I recently drove the Icefields Parkway in February with my 14-year-old identical twin boys. We were searching for Alberta's famous deep powder to ski, and we found that in abundance. The skiing around this neck of the woods starts before Christmas and lasts into late May -- so it's a darned good reason to be there. If you're a downhill skier, you have to ski Lake Louise at the southern end of the Parkway, and Marmot Basin at its northern end. And, of course, while you are there, you might as well ski Sunshine, Banff Mount Norquay, Fortress Mountain and Nakiska. All of those areas received a dump of fresh powder while we were there. But we also envied the non-skiers who had more time to sample the hiking, backpacking, snowshoeing, dogsledding, mountaineering, rock and ice climbing, fishing (the world-famous Bow River is right here, as is the start of the mighty Athabaska which eventually flows into the Arctic Ocean), swimming, rafting and wildlife watching that made us want to come back again in another season. The only thing the immediate area doesn't offer is hunting -- you have go outside the park boundaries for that. But the rest of Alberta offers superb hunting for huge whitetail deer, mule deer, elk, bears (both black and grizzly), mountain lions, wolves, moose, and bighorn sheep. Plus there's tremendous bird hunting out on the prairies for both waterfowl and upland species. But I digress... Any journey on the Icefields Parkway begins before you actually get there. Your natural jumping off spot is Calgary, which we reached via Air Canada, a city worth a day of exploration for its natural history museums and sports facilities. Driving west on Route 1 from Calgary, you'll be tempted to take a detour in "Kananaskis Country." We did, staying two nights at the Lodge at Kananaskis, and boy are we glad we did. This is a real family adventure destination. We found fresh powder and wonderful skiing at nearby Fortress Mountain, but if we weren't skiers we'd have hiked the bare-ground trails on the valley floor, gone dogsledding or snowshoeing in the snowy foothills, maybe even fished the inviting Elbow River and its tributaries. As it was, all we did was ski our legs to jelly, swim in the pool and relax in the outdoor hot tub -- not too shabby a way to pass a winter day. Back out on Route 1 and headed west again, we paid our entrance fee ($10/day Canadian for the car and three passengers) and entered Banff National Park. We promptly got sidetracked by a quick look at the town of Banff -- a quintessential tourist trap where my wife would have happily spent the entire day prowling the little shops had she been along -- and a day of skiing at Sunshine. Sunshine's definitely worth the side trip, even if you don't ski -- there's a hotel way up in a high valley that you can only reach by Gondola. In the summer, we'd have wanted to climb to the top of 9,200-foot Goat's Eye Mountain and walked through the natural arch created by wind erosion up there. It's visible from the road just below the ski-area parking lot. As it was, we consoled ourselves with powder skiing. We reluctantly left Sunshine for a night at the Chateau Lake Louise, which is by far the most luxurious and beautiful hotel we have ever seen, let alone stayed in. It's set on a small lake, surrounded by 10,000-foot mountains rising almost straight up from the shores. Incredible! Normally, being outdoorsy sorts, we wouldn't even think about staying in someplace that fancy. But the strength of the American dollar and the add-on recreation packages they offer with your accommodations make this a luxury within reach. Indulge yourself at least this once. From Chateau Lake Louise, we headed to Lake Louise ski area for some steeps, chutes and powder, but we could have as easily used the day to explore the sights along the Parkway, which starts just a few kilometers up the road. Basically, the road winds up one long valley surrounded by mountains, switchbacks up a saddle to the Columbia Icefields and then descends another long valley to Jasper. The Icefield is literally the peak of the experience. In fact, it's a triple apex on the continental divide. Waters melting from the glacier can run into the Columbia River, which flows into the Pacific, the Athabasca, which empties into the Arctic Ocean, or the Saskatchewan River, which runs into the Atlantic via Hudson's Bay. From May 1 until late October, the Icefields is a major tourist center, with tour buses and guided tours that take you out onto the glaciers themselves and a huge "Interpretive Center" that shows both the man-made and natural history of the area. We'd have loved to see it, but the snow drifts across the entrance road were 10 feet deep! In winter, however, the highway itself is an adventure. On both of our passes through the Icefields, the wind was whipping fresh snow and creating arctic conditions. Adventuresome as we are, we had no desire to set off on foot -- even dressed in ski clothes. Driving was interesting -- to say the least. This is definitely Jeep country. But the scenery alone was worth the trek. Mile upon mile, range upon range of the most gorgeous, craggy beautiful mountains. Dropping off the Icefields into the relative shelter of the valley, we stopped to watch ice climbers inching their way up a 300-foot frozen waterfall. In summer, rock climbers and mountaineers play on these same cliffs and peaks. The Icefields Parkway ends (or begins, depending on your perspective) in Jasper, a neat little mountain town that lives and breathes outdoor adventuring. We skied at nearby Marmot Basin, another area rich in powder, steeps and chutes. My kids, especially, like extreme skiing, so we never see the easy part of any ski area. While riding up a chairlift, a friendly local told me about the excellent fly fishing and lake fishing he enjoys all summer long. He mentioned that trout over 5 pounds were a fairly common sight, and that the big ones topped the 12-pound mark. Whew! I got the feeling from the quiet way he told his stories that these weren't just fish tales. In Jasper, we stayed at Jasper Park Lodge, another "adventure center" for families with great package prices. In the hot tub and heated outdoor pool at night we heard other families excitedly discussing their day's adventures on cross-country skis, snowshoes (one photographer saw over 500 elk while roaming the nearby valley) and dog sled. In the summer, they have hiking trails, horseback adventures, canoe trails and rafting expeditions, along with swimming and mountain climbing. One night, we couldn't stand it any more and signed up for a moonlight guided "Canyon Crawl" in nearby Maligne Canyon. Wearing cleats on waterproof rubber boots, our little group explored the floor of the 100-foot deep canyon -- an area that's underwater all spring and summer. Wearing headlamps we found sea-floor fossils embedded in the vertical face of the canyon walls. The only problem we experienced in the Banff/Jasper area is that we didn't have enough time to explore all the side roads and see and do everything that there was to do in the winter. And that's only a single season. This is a destination worth exploring, and there's lots to do if you can see beyond the magnificent scenery. Copyright © 1999 Tim Jones. All rights reserved.