A road trip along Canada's scenic Icefields Parkway
BY LORI RACKL Travel Editor
Lauded as one of North America's most scenic highways, the Icefields Parkway stretches 143 miles between Jasper and Lake Louise in western Canada's Rockies.
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Updated: November 19, 2010 5:02PM
JASPER, Alberta - Hailed as one of the most scenic drives in North America, western Canada's Icefields Parkway is like the Greatest Hits of mountain scenery.
Lakes the color of robin eggs. Snow-capped peaks topping 11,000 feet. Thunderous waterfalls. Alpine meadows studded with wildflowers. Throw in the possibility of spotting a grizzly or moose along this picturesque route between Jasper and Lake Louise, and you've got just about the most perfect 143 miles of pavement on the planet.
Even so, my 9-year-old stepson in the backseat had his nose buried in a Harry Potter book. I felt a twinge of sympathy for my dad, who, 25 years earlier, had to beg - OK, threaten - my younger sister and me to get us out of our family's station wagon to watch the sun rise over the Grand Canyon.
At least the karma gods didn't taunt me for long. Less than half an hour into our day-long road trip in the Canadian Rockies, Ben put down his book. And we pulled over for our first stop: Athabasca Falls.
This mighty cataract is where the river by the same name barges through a narrow gorge and plummets 75 feet with the kind of power that reminds you Mother Nature runs this house, and you'd better not misbehave.
"That's so cool," Ben gushed from the overlook.
Harry who-
Athabasca Falls is one of many reasons to put the car in park while cruising along the continent's backbone. The Icefields Parkway, named for the massive reservoirs of frozen water feeding more than 100 glaciers along the route, is long on scenic overlooks, hiking trails and natural attractions. It's short on souvenir stands, tourist traps -and gas stations, so fill 'er up before you go.
It's possible to drive the entire parkway in about three hours. But that would be like eating a bag of Taco Bell gorditas on your way to dinner at Topolobampo. What a waste to speed straight past this kind of scenery and not savor the surroundings.
Our longest layover came about halfway through the drive, along the border of two of Canada's top national parks: Jasper and Banff. This is where you'll find Columbia Icefield, the largest of its kind south of Alaska. You could fit nearly 100 Central Parks on this hulking heap of ice, whose sweat feeds the streams and rivers that eventually funnel their way into the Atlantic, Pacific and Arctic oceans.
Our sights were set on the icefield's Athabasca Glacier, an unusually accessible glacier within walking distance of the parkway. It's retreating at a rate of 16 feet a year, but this nearly four-mile-long tongue of ice is plenty big for now.
You can mosey right onto the glacier, but keep in mind that nothing ruins a vacation like a stumble into a hidden crevasse. Play it safe by going on a guided ice walk. Or - if a certain 9-year-old in your party likes all-terrain vehicles - shell out some cash for a trip on the Ice Explorer ($49 for adults, $24 for kids ages 6-15). These motorcoaches with monster 5-foot-tall tires leave regularly mid-April through mid-October from the Columbia Icefield Centre. They take as many as 56 passengers on an 80-minute tour, driving by bighorn sheep and straight onto Athabasca's belly, giving you about 20 minutes to poke around, snap some photos and get a real taste of the glacier.
"Mmm, that's good," Ben said, after taking off his gloves to scoop up handfuls of the glacier's frigid water, bottles of which are for sale across the street in a vending machine.
One of the high points of our road trip - both literally and figuratively - came at kilometer 190 (mile 118). Bow Summit ranks as the loftiest point on the Icefields Parkway at an elevation of 6,840 feet.
We stopped here and filled our lungs with pine-scented air as we climbed up a short, steep path to a perch overlooking the teal waters of Peyto Lake. It's one of those "we should make this our Christmas card" backdrops, which explains why throngs of people were jockeying for prime photo positions along the overlook's railing.
We were back on the road for barely 10 minutes when I made my husband pull over again. Several cars had stopped along the shoulder, even though there wasn't a scenic overlook or attraction nearby. This could only mean one thing: wildlife.
"There's a bear roaming around here," a camera-toting motorist explained.
We waited for some majestic grizzly to pop out of the woods, but the only form of life we saw were cyclists. Most were carrying their gear in their bikes' saddlebags, leisurely pedaling between the hostels, hotels and campsites along this amazing ribbon of road.
"We're headed all the way to the hot springs [in Banff]," one enthusiastic, middle-aged cyclist said.
"Just a few hills along the way," her partner added in a non-sarcastic Canadian way.
It struck me that the only thing better than driving the Icefields Parkway would be to bike it.
As the pair pedaled toward their hot springs, we made our way to a body of a water that's anything but warm.
The temperature of Lake Louise rarely reaches 50 degrees, even in summer. While it wouldn't be fun to swim in, it sure is fun to look at. The expansive lake spreads like an aquamarine carpet at the foot of pine-covered mountains, glaciers and the Fairmont's fairytale-like Chateau Lake Louise hotel.
What gives these glacial lakes a Caribbean blue hue, you ask- Even if you didn't ask, here's the answer: Glaciers grind the rock under them into a fine powder, which gets carried into the lake by meltwaters. The resulting silty water absorbs all colors of incoming light except the vivid aqua-blue that gets reflected back to our eyes.
Lake Louise is said to be one of the most photographed lakes in North America - a fitting finale to one of the continent's most photogenic road trips.
Our drive took eight hours to cover 143 miles. Even at that slow pace, it felt like we were rushing it.
When I come back to the Icefields Parkway - and I will - I want to have more time. And half as many wheels.
Information for this article was gathered on a research trip sponsored in part by Travel Alberta and Fairmont Hotels & Resorts.
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