Stampeding to Calgary - a bit late! 16th August Off roading!

[parisdisneyfan]

We woke to another hazy morning with the promise of a warm day. Dh decided where to go today and we started by driving down in to Canmore and out the other side up to the Nordic centre. This was where the Nordic events were held in the 1988 Calgary Olympics. We had a wander around and watched some people practising shooting at the Biathlon arena. They were just walking around before shooting but there was a chap who was on roller ski-s and he was doing a bit of a lap before lying down and shooting. He kept this up for quite a while!

We had heard about a trail called Grassi Lakes so thought we would try to find it. The road seemed to turn into a gravel track or down a steep hill. I looked it up and discovered it is a real highway (742) but unpaved and goes to Kananskis Lakes. Quite a few people had commented that it was very good for wildlife, they had also taken rental cars on it with no problems. We decided to try it for a few miles. To be honest it wasn’t too bad, we quite often drive on the tank roads across Salisbury Plain and it was comparable with them. The thing that surprised us was the big lorries and the speed that people were going! It was very dusty though and the car now looks terrible. We stopped at a couple of places but the trails were all serious lengths here so we just pushed on to the end where it becomes tarmaced again. We then followed the 40 with a couple of stops. The first was at the Peter Lougheed Centre, which is a large visitor centre with some exhibits about the area. They had a animal spotting board which said what had been spotted when and where. Apparently a young bull moose had been seen by the Upper Lake so we headed there with a stop at the Boultons trading post to pick up a picnic for lunch. It was a nice spot around the man made lake but no wildlife, although I did see a lot of hoof prints in the mud where they had been spotted.

We headed back up through Kanaskis village and saw a sign saying beware of Rocky Mountain Sheep and as if by magic there were 4 standing in the middle of the carriage way! These are big beasts, shetland pony size with huge curled horns, but sadly no photos. We stopped at a couple of turnouts but no walks took our fancy. When the 40 joined with Highway 1 we went straight over and continued up the 1a, which is definitely not the scenic route it is further up. This is the mining side of Canmore with I think about 4-5 big plants. However we did see some more sheep up a cliff!

Back to the hotel around 4 and I caught up with notes sitting on the balcony. Chicken fajitas for tea and that was our first week over!

[jocat]

The Nordic Centre seems a good place to spend a bit of time. We saw people training for the Biathlon too. I didn’t know anything about the sport before that. The penalties if you miss the target seemed a bit mean!

I wouldn’t worry about the car looking terrible with the dust - I can’t imagine anyone takes a hire car back looking pristine when they’ve visited the Rockies.

It’s nice that you’ve seen a few sheep today. I know they’re only sheep but I got quite excited every time I saw one.

[WileyCoyote]

Different day and some wildlife too hurrah.
Interesting to go off route a bit , my hubby would be fretting about cleaning the car afterwards !