Jasper Day 2

We awoke to pouring rain. How disappointing. Ah well, we set out to make the best of it and headed out to Mount Edith Cavell. Donning our full complement of warm clothes and wet weather gear – including umbrellas – we headed off along the Path of the Glacier.

Mt Edith Cavell

Angel Glacier

This is a truly spectacular and very special place. You don't find this one in the general guides - at least not the ones I have picked up. But it is such an amazing walk. The drive up is very long and winding but the walk around the Glacier loop is really quite short. The views are exceptional even in the rain.


My days of senior geography are flooding back. The unit of study on V-shaped valleys (river) and U-shaped valleys (glacial) was one of my favourites. I am certainly living the life.

All rugged up - a brief moment without rain

Cavell Glacier

A small piece from earlier glacier calving

Looking down the glacier valley

After leaving Mt Edith Cavell we continued on down the road until we reached Athabasca Falls. This is in the guide books and it does not disappoint, especially as the melt water volumes are very high this summer. The sheer power and scale of this sight really can't be conveyed by pictures alone. I hope you can get a sense of it though by looking carefully for the people on the right hand side of the picture.

Athabasca Falls

The log in the above photo is being swirled around and around and getting caught every time in this pot hole. Will it join the others which are trapped, with no way out, deeper into another pot hole or will it end up in a current to take it further downstream? We did not wait to find out.

Weather not so good - the scenery excellent!!

The symbol of Alberta

After leaving Athabasca Falls, we headed north on the Icefields Parkway back towards Jasper until we reached the trail head for the Five Lakes walk. This had bee recommended to us by our host at the B&B in Jasper. The walk was quite undulating but manageable. These wild roses are in flower in a few places so as it is the Alberta symbol I could not resist taking a pic.

The trail Five Lakes Walk

From my guiding days I always remember the song about "Land of the Silver Birch ..." This stand of trees really stood out among the predominantly conifer landscape. The mirror image in the 2nd of the five lakes shows the more usual forest scenery.


The five lakes by the way were actually only two as four had been joined together because of the heavy rains.

Well, we may not have taken a trip on it but we did see it pull in to Jasper as we were enjoying our final meal there. We are quite content doing what we are doing. We can wait till the Alaska cruise to be waited on.