Our day started with a coffee stop at Eclipse Roasting Company, which is right next door to JK Bakery and both did not disappoint. Great way to start the morning. We are all feeling rested after a good nights sleep and ready to go!
My friend Alisa told me about a GPS guided tour app, so I downloaded that and as we drove, it told us what we were driving by, where to stop, the history of the area, etc. It is awesome. It is called GuideAlong and we have decided to call the narrator our “Car Boyfriend”. 🤣 Thank you Alisa!!
This app is how we learned about Crowfoot Glacier off the Icefield Parkway. It used to have 3 toes, and now it only has two toes due to the glacier melting. We called it the 2-toed crow, which then led us down a rabbit hole of eventually it being a 1-toed crow and then eventually just an ankle. LOL! Anyway…I digress.
We passed through a grizzly prolific area where the land provides the perfect conditions for a Mama Bear to raise her young, so there is a large population of grizzlies in that particular area.
Our first hike of the day was on the Mistaya Canyon Trail off of the Icefield Parkway. It was a 1.2 mile loop to an amazing river which has cut its way through and created a beautiful canyon. We sang songs along the trail to warn any bears we were coming, kept the mood high and had a great hike. This hike is a good one to start the day and warm up the legs.
Our second hike was at Peyto (Pee-Toe) Lake. It was a 1.5 mile loop, with some good uphill at the beginning on a paved road, which later turned into dirt (hallelujah). This lake is a gorgeous, Glacier fed lake with the icy blue color from the “rock flour” (as explained yesterday). It is even more vibrant when the sun is out above the lake. This might have been my favorite lake of the whole trip!
After that hike we stopped at Bow Lake Lodge to look at the gift shop and then continued on our way to Johnstons Canyon, our last hike of the day.
Johnstons Canyon was the Disneyland of hiking trails. There were so many people and it was extremely busy and frantic as people would run by us going up and down the trail. It was not our vibe at all and quite discouraging at first.
Our our way to Lower Falls we saw a baby black bear climbing a tree and a park ranger doing his best to move the bear along, however his tactics weren’t working (it looked like a rubber bullet gun). The poor bear was so scared and running from tree to tree. Not sure where the mother was, but we kept moving forward and let the ranger do his job.
We eventually got to Lower Falls and there was a massive line just to get a photo in front of the waterfall.
We decided to skip the line and continue on to Upper Falls where the crowds thinned out and we could enjoy a more leisurely stroll. We made our way up to the upper falls, snapped a few photos and then headed back down, winding through the canyon on a suspended platform which hung off the side of the canyon walls; it was quite beautiful.
On our way back down, we saw several rangers again, still trying to manage the bear cub. The rangers said they had been at this for 4 hours now and there was talk of closing the trail down until they could better handle the situation. We were on our way out, so I hope they were able to do that and give the poor bear some space and let him get back across the trail.
Once we were back at the parking lot, a fox ran right next to the car. That was pretty cool to see and a nice way to end the hiking day. We’ve been so lucky with all of these animal sightings.
We were hungry now so we drove into the small town of Banff to see what we could get into. We ended up at The Park, which is a gin distillery and dinner place. We had a nice dinner, talked about our amazing day and then headed back to our AirBnB.
We are exhausted! It was a long day, but worth all the beauty we saw, laughs we had and memories made. We only drove up about half of the Icefield Parkway today. Tomorrow we will drive the rest into Jasper National Park.
Trail Distances:
Hike 1: Mistaya Canyon Trail, 1.4 miles, 292 elevation gain
Hike 2: Peyto (Pee-Toe) Lake Lookout, 1.67 miles, 361 elevation gain
Hike 3: Upper Johnston Falls, 3.97 miles, 1025 elevation gain
Animal sightings today: Black bear cub, Fox, Chipmunks
📍 Indigenous lands of the Iyârhe Nakoda Nations (Bearspaw, Wesley, Chiniki), the Blackfoot Confederacy (Siksika, Kainai, Piikani), the Tsuut’ina – part of the Dene people, Ktunaxa, Secwépemc, Mountain Cree, and Métis.
Byrds On A Wire 