A quiet retreat in a the fabulous Canadian Rockies playground!
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Canmore held a 10 day Bike Fest in July this year, featuring bike park jams, hill climbs, mountain bike races, road stage races, etc. We went down to watch some of the criterium, which is a flat out road race around about 6 city blocks on flat ground, with lots of corners - for 30 laps!. It's not for the faint of heart! Below is a 30 second video taken with an iPhone that gives you an idea how fast they go!
Monday, June 6, we headed out to hike Sentinel Pass in the Lake Louise area. We dropped bikes off at Moraine Lake, and then left the car at the trailhead for Paradise Valley. Sentinel Pass is 11.7 km, with about 2300 vertical feet of gain - near the end being very steep and rocky. We passed by Lake Annette, which is a very nice subalpine vista. At this time, we weren't required to hike in groups of 4, which is the usual anti-grizzly rule.
We really didn't see that many people, and the weather was perfect. Once over the pass, we started encountering more hikers coming from the Moraine Lake side. Hard to beat the view of the Ten Peaks surrounding Moraine Lake! Gorgeous colour!
When we got to Moraine Lake, we jumped on our bikes and cranked out the 9 kms back to the car. Pretty fast last few kms! We chomped on beaucoup watermelon to re-hydrate - a nice summertime treat.
Doing the circuit this way avoids nutty parking situation at Moraine - on a Monday!
The Bow River through Banff was running fairly high, with a nice cloudy blue colour from the tail end of spring runoff and brief showers we've had. Again, another nice day to go play in the kayaks. We parked below Bow Falls amongst the myriad of tourists, and the current quickly took us away to the very beautiful run towards Canmore. It's basically Class 1 water, with a few channels to choose from on occasion, and fallen trees along the cutbanks to stay clear of.
The first section goes by hoodoos formed from erosion of the thick glacial deposits. After that, the views of Rundle and Tunnel Mountains keep you entertained. On this occasion, we saw one blue heron - no other wildlife. There was only one other group of canoeists along the way.
Once in Canmore, we pulled the kayaks into a friend's yard, grabbed the road bikes, and zipped back to Banff along the Legacy Trail to retrieve the vehicle. That revives your legs after a 2.5 hour paddle!
Another great way to spend a day in Canmore-Banff!
