8pm arrive in Banff!

On a positive note, we ended up with a new suv 4x4 luxurious (heated seats) car, costing roughly £300 for the whole trip. Oh and a free satnav! Instead we would have had a small hatchback costing about £800. We also got to drive past the Rockies during sunset 😊

Here’s me driving: (#Ilookhorrendous!)

Here’s Sam driving:

Well it didn’t disappoint. As we turned round the corner to see the lake we both gasped in owe. The colour of the water is a bright turquoise and so clear. Neither of our cameras were any good at showing the colour of the water that well, but this is probably the best one...

The mountains frame the lake well and are so huge that you feel very small; a humbling experience.

We walked around the lake right to the end where it was very tranquil, still and silent.

We saw some wildlife 😁 First thing we saw was a chipmunk. Unfortunately it was too fast for me to get a picture but it was about the size of a mouse but black, furry with white stripes on its back.

Then, as we drove away from the Lake we saw a Moose!! It was just grazing near to the road and looked pretty chilled.

It was a great day but very cold! We’re struggling to get above 2’c here and I couldn’t warm up last night despite wearing my thermals.

Check in tomorrow 😊!

Bow Falls was a pleasant short walk down the river. Nothing spectacular but worth the visit.

On the way back we visited the local Farmers Market where there was a folk/country singer playing. The original itinerary had us down for outside yoga at this place but sod that in this 2’ weather!

In the evening we treated ourselves to a trip on the Gondola and dinner at the top. I’ve never been on a gondola before but again, the accessibility was good and I just had to push up a ramp and park up..

The views at the top were AMAZING! We were lucky to also get a window seat at the restaurant where we watched the night time fall over the mountains.

The food was delicious and I happily drank a large Pinot Grigio, leaving Sam to drive me home 🤣

(Not my best photos, I know!)

After shopping for about an hour we went for lunch as I felt very nauseous. Unfortunately, as soon as we finished there I had to ask Sam to take me home. It was only a matter of time before I ‘crashed’ from doing much more activity than what I’m used to. Once back at the hotel I went to sleep and warmed up a bit -it was sleeting and snowing all day. I was disappointed that we couldn’t finish our shopping but like Sam said, they’ll be plenty more opportunities to get stuff along the way.

I woke up at about 5pm and got ready to go for dinner, only to then discover that my left wheel had a bloody puncture! It is still unresolved as we’ve tried to take it to bike shops but no-one has the right size inner tubing. Thankfully I have my spare mountain bike style wheels but they are a bit big to wear everyday really.

At 7:20pm we went for a drive around Canmore to see if we could see any wildlife at dusk. Despite seeing a lit up flashing sign warning us that bears were active in the area, we didn’t see anything!

As we were in Canmore we decided to eat dinner there which was nice because the town is less touristy and quite cute. I had two cocktails and some nice gnocchi which ended the day nicely.

Hopefully tomorrow will be a little better.

The colour of the water was as it says on the tin and so clear! It was very picturesque, especially with the snow topped mountains and wild forest all around us. It was so wild that as we entered the walk around the lake we were greeted with this sign:

So that was a bit unnerving! But we didn’t see any bears, just pretty birds and 2 chipmunks, both of which were major posers!

We managed to walk around about 2/3 of the lake which was long enough really.

There were parts of the walk that felt very remote and untamed which was fun to explore (obviously whilst watching out for bears). This lake has been the most tranquil and peaceful of all the lakes we have visited so far, which is partly due to the lack of tourists about. It was nice to experience something that was a bit more authentic for Canada.

We took a lunch break at a nearby hotel where I had a cheeseboard with bread and fruit, but no butter, instead a pot of honeycomb. It’s something that the canadians seem to like -honey and cheese, and I have to admit it was pretty good.

We then drove to Lake Moraine and spent a short amount of time there as the path wasn’t accessible for very far. Lake moraine was the thing that inspired me to go to Canada. I once saw a beautiful picture of it on a poster and immediately wanted to know where the place was. Unfortunately my photography skills aren’t as good as the person who took the one in the poster, but I still got some decent shots. Again, the water is turquoise but it doesn’t come out as well in the pictures compared to what you see when you are standing right by it.