Rocky Mountain High!

~BounceBounceBounce~!

Wow! They are Awesome! The Rocky Mountains!

We left Edmonton for Jasper and soon the terrain became more hilly and the fields disappeared and were replaced with ever thickening forests.
It took some time but as we were at the top of a hill we spotted some mountains peeking up in the distance. As we got closer we got more excited. We soon realized that the mountains jump right up fairly abruptly with little in the way of foothills.
It was truly amazing to finally see the Rocky Mountains after a month of traveling. We stopped a lot and took tons of pictures.
We eventually got to the Jasper National Park and soon were in the city of Jasper in the middle of the park. This place is a total tourist city with lots of places to buy campy souvenirs. We wandered around the city to look at the various places and got some dinner. There were a lot of Japanese tourists amazingly and we discovered a clue as to why. There are Hot springs in these mountains! We missed them on the way in but there are more in Banff so we will make a stop there on the way back!
We got a room that cost us much more than it was worth and rested from put long exciting drive.
The next day we headed to the Athabasca Falls which are a major attraction for the park. On the way there we found a ton of people pulling over to the side of the road to take pictures of an entire heard of elk that was grazing in the forest right next to one of the camp grounds. Some of the campers must have had an interesting morning! We got to the falls and took a ton of pictures and explored the area. The mountain water is amazing! You have never seen such a colour!
On the way back we stoped at a lake to check it out and found that there were a lot of people swiming there. We ran to get our swim gear and found a place to hang out. The water was COLD! I was dangling my feet in it and they were hurting from the cold on about 30 seconds. As I am not a polar bear I did not go all the way in and instead contented myself with some warm rays from the sun. John did bravely dive in and soon realized his folly! Instead we watched some braver souls cliff diving from what looked to be about a 5 story cliff face.
We left the park and headed off for the British Columbia border. We found the info centre and a surprise. The amazing snow covered slopes of Mount Robson. The pictures don't do it justice but do take a look.
We passed over the head waters of the Frazer River, famous for it's Salmon. We drove into the evening past peak after peak until we got to Kamloops and settled down for the night.