Lake Louise

Known as the "Jewell of the rockies", this enormous lake provides stunning views of the Victoria Glacier nestled behind it. We also visted the famous Lake Louis hotel built in 1890 as a back water tea house. That's where the photos of the elk heads were taken. We preferred seeing the live versions at Jasper.

Morraine Lake

If there is a lake in heaven, I would imagine it would look something like this. Shimmering emerald waters, dotted with the occasional kayak, fringed by tall, regal pine trees, surrounded by towering glaciers and soaring mountain peaks. If I ever grow tired of life, I'll book myself off for a month and come here to meditate. Absolutely beautiful.

Canadian Critters

The Canadian Rockies is home to a plethora of wildlife and we saw lots of it.

On our first day in the park, we sighted a black bear on the road which caused me great excitement as it is on my life list. Then to crown the experience, we spotted a bear and two cubs the following night. Unfortunatley in both cases, we were too excited and the experience too fleeting to take a photo.

Not so with the big horn sheep - the male above posed beautfully for the camera.

The photo of the Columbian Ground Squirrel was taken at our camp site in Banff - they were pesky little fellows who dive bombed pine cones from the tree early every morning onto Trish and Mike's camp trailer - waking them up to what seemed like the battle of Britain. When we left, we swept a hundred cones off the trailer roof and then we watched as a particularly energetic little squirrel (phographed above) retrieved every single one of them to take off to his nest near by.

The Golden Mantled Ground Squirrels posed for us at Morraine Lake. We climbed a rock stack for better views of the lake and these cute little creatures kept popping up from the rocks just above us, peering down curiously,

The elk stag was photographed at our camp site at Jasper. He was there with his concubine of over ten females. It's rutting season so he was very energetic and kept charging about, rounding up his ladies, even coming between our tent and trailor to do so. So we had some very close up views indeed. But we had to be cautious too - the wardens warned us that it wasn't a good idea to get between a rutting elk and the objects of his affection.

The juvenile Osprey was photographed on a nest on a bridge near Banff. These beautiful birds are quite common here, thanks to the abundance of fish in the lake. The Clarke's Nutcracker was a lively and very arial bird that is common in the forests. The Loon is a symbol of "wild Canada" - it's beautiful, playful and has a wonderful call.

In total, I saw 15 new species of birds in the Rockies (thanks to my long suffering and very patient family who were very good about stopping off at lakes for me to do some twitching!)

Columbian Ground Squirrel



Big Horn Sheep





Golden Mantled Ground Squirrel





Elk






Clarke's Nutcracker





Common Loon





Osprey


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Birds seen in Rockies

• Bald Eagle
• Common Loon
• Red Necked Grebe
• Western Grebe
• Barn Swallow
• Great Blue Heron
• American Crow
• Red-breasted Nuthatch
• DArk Eyed Junco
• Yellow Rumped Warbler
• Clarke's Nutcracker
• Black-billed Magpie
• American Goldfinch
• Brewer's Blackbird
• Common Merganser

New birds we saw in Vernon

• American Goldfinch
• Common Merganser
• Californian Quail
• White-tailed kite
• Northern Flicker
• American robin
• Redwinged Blackbird
• Belted Kingfisher
• Common Yellowthroat
• Red-tailed Hawk
• American Wigeon
• Kildeer

Camping Life in The Rockies

Go Kyle Go!

Went to watch Kyle play in a basketball final. Our first live game and it was an absolute cracker. Neck and neck right till the end when a couple of penalties from Kyle (see the photo) edged his team to a 39 - 35 win. Very exciting and great that we could be there to see it. The lovely girl in the photo with Kyle is his girlfriend, Tasha.

Kayaking in Vernon

We've met up with Mike and Trish in Vernon - wonderful to see them again. Delight of delights, we also got to finally meet my elusive cousin , Kyle. What a wonderful, charming (and very tall!) guy. Mike took us for a paddle in one of the local lakes today which was a tremendous fun and a very good work out. Cherry on the top was seeing Osprey and Megansers (a type of Canadian duck.)

Vancouver

Wow, what a gorgeous, fabulous city!! I can see why it is routinely voted as one of the top three cities in the world to live in. We met up with Keira at her flat on Friday evening and spent a wonderful weekend with her. So great to see my lovely, bubbly cousin again! She lives in a very nice flat downtown that is really central. We got to sleep on her bed; she on the floor. How's that for family spirit! She absolutely rocks as a guide and showed us all the sites with great relish. We had a fantastic time visiting Granville Island and Stanley Park and slogging up the "Grouse Grind." Also went shopping to capitalise on the power of the mighty pound in Canada - and had our first true "sushi" meal - a very fishy (and delicious) "all you can eat" affair.

Stanley Park

Stanley Park is a beautiful park just a stone's throw away from Keira's flat in downtown Vancouver. Its got it all: beautiful beaches, dense forest, a hidden lagoon and great rollerblading trails. Had a very refreshing swim and we hired blades - Keira is as fearless as me on two wheels so we passed a lot of cyclists on the way down the hills. The park also has some stunning "rock on rock" sculptures to add to the ambience. How the artist manages to get some of the rocks to balance I'll never know.

Granville Island

Granville Island is the "Covent Garden" of Vancouver with lots of markets and street shows. Had the best cappuccino of my life here - the Canadian sure know how to make good coffee. Ally was in 7th heaven with all the arts and crafts.

Hiking "The Grouse Grind"

We hiked up to the top of Grouse Mountain for beautiful views over Vancouver. The name of the hike "The Grouse Grind" should have been a warning. Three kilometers of straight up. Made Skeletons Gorge seem like a kids' picnic. The elation (and relief) at reaching the top was worth it though. Not to mention the $90 we saved on cable car fees. Was also a good warm up for all the hiking that's to come. There was an animal sanctuary at the top for wolves and bears. Got to see the wolf but the bears were sleeping.







Enjoyed a bird show featuring some impressive flying antics from a falcon and an owl with the most beautiful eyes. As you can see the zoom on our new camera (one of our purchases in Vancouver) was put to good use.




We also watched a "lumber jack" show with an awe inspiring demonstration of "log dicing" and"log climbing" from three world champion lumber jacks and some hilarious gags.

Kerry's birthday party in London

Our Pride and Joy

You may remember we spoke about our Orchid back in May. Well, we're deligted that it has finally flowered with avengeance - 5 beautiful flowers and one bud still waiting to open. It's our surrogate baby (that's what happens when you have neither kids not pets) so we're feeling like proud parents!!

Cambridge Boot Sale

Had lots of fun selling all our surplus stuff at the boot sale today. Amazing how much junk you accumulate during 5 years. We made £ 250 and met some cool (and some very strange!) people. When we get to Australia, we'll definitely consider boot sales as a way of getting hold of some bargains.