A bear in the tree is better than two in the bush, or something like that.

So today was the first tour day I'd booked for Jasper, a trip up to the icefields.  When I first got on the bus I was thinking, oh god here we go again, bringing down the average age.  I felt especially out of place on this trip, there were just so few young people.  The first stop was a waterfall and while beautiful, at the first photo stop it was jammed full of people and you had to wait a while to get a picture.  I was thinking I'd made a mistake booking this trip.  A bit further down the track it was a bit quieter so not so bad. And the day just kept getting better so no regrets.   I also ran into three people from the train, the German (who I'd also seen up the skytram) and the Carolinian couple.

Though I should have known from the get go when we started our day with seeing a bear in a tree.  Even our Australian guide, Simon, was excited about that, saying he'd never seen a bear in a tree before.  Our driver, Mark, who did the running commentary and was Canadian, saw a couple of RV's stopped and said one stopped was probably looking at a map, two meant animal jam (animal related traffic jam).  So he pulled over and sure enough there was the bear.

First animal sighting of the day was an elk,

Then there was a bear in a tree.  I was in completely the wrong part of the bus to get a photo of him up the tree but did get this very blurry photo of him ambling away.  

The crush of people at viewing point one at the waterfall.

Not a bad view though.  Athabasca falls.

The photo doesn't show the colour the way it looked.  I asked the guide and he explained the colour comes because the water comes from the glaciers and picks up rock sediment on the way.  Apparently the colour changes depending on the light as well.

After the falls we drove up to the Columbia icefields.  Our glacier driver later explained that we don't actually go to the Columbia icefield, you have to be a very skilled climber to get there, but they call the area that.  First was lunch, where I sat with a couple from Rotorua and had a great chat.  They were on a once in a lifetime trip up through the rockies and then to America.

Side note, all the workers around these places have name tags which include where they're from.  Most seem to be from overseas, and there are so many Australians and Kiwi's it's ridiculous. 

After lunch it was over the road to get loaded into an ice truck (it has a proper name I can't for the life of me remember).  Our driver on this was Paige from Halifax.  Apparently a couple of years ago half of their driving staff were females, which is awesome.  Paige was hilarious.  On the way back she told us a bunch of stories about other trips on to the glacier and I could see why she didn't tell us on the way out there. One was about getting stuck on the glacier when the weather turned once, with a coach load of tourists who spoke no English and had food poisoning.  Apparently she holds the record for the driver to get stuck on the glacier the most.  She also took great joy in driving us back as there had been a flash flood and part of the road way was now under water.  She thought it was fantastic.  The glacier was stunning.  So beautiful.  We lucked out and the sun came out when we were up there.  Well worth the trip.  We're very lucky to be allowed out there.  According to Paige the glaciers are dropping at a rate of 15ft.  She told us she wasn't supposed to say anything about global warming, but she did anyway.

The glacier from across the road, the lunch spot.

The steepest unpaved road in North America.  Apparently it used to catch out a bunch of tourists who could get down it but not back up again.

Standing on the glacier.

There are 24 of these vehicles in existence, there are 5 of them.  One is owned by the US government used in Antarctica, the other is owned by someone else down there.  The remaining 22 are all here at the Columbia icefield.

NZ flag on the glacier.

NZer on the glacier.

Glacier from behind a wall of ice.

Another glacier looking like it's about to fall.  Apparently it's looked like that since the 50s.

Our vehicle.  Tires are about as tall as me.  They cost $6000 each.  This is one of their newest trucks so costs about $2 million.  The older one's are a more reasonable $1.2 million.

The water (and parts of the ice) were so blue.

Mountain sheep.

After the glacier we drove back down the road to the glacier skywalk, a glass path suspended over the valley.  On the way we saw a mountain sheep, and while there we saw mountain goats.  A pretty good haul over all for animal sightings.

Looking down on the glacier skywalk.

There are mountain goats in this photo, I swear.  Up against the trees.

Skywalk done me and the German from the train were dropped back at the lunch spot across from the glacier with a cookie to wait for the shuttle to take us back to Jasper.  The rest of the bus were heading up to Lake Louise.  The drive back was just as beautiful.  I got caught up staring at the trees trying to spot animals and every now and then would look up and see the mountains and be wowed all over again.  We also lucked out and saw a bear up a tree again (probably the same one) and this time I was on the right side to get a blurry photo.

Weather closing in.

Bear in a tree.

Back into Jasper with not quite enough time to visit the museum, hopefully tomorrow.  Planning on going to the local beer brewery for dinner, if my stomach can hold out for the 8 minute walk.