Day 4 – Columbia Icefield
November 7th, 2008 Posted in 2008 Alaska trip2008-06-17,Tuesday
Columbia Icefield campground, Jasper NP (09:34) to Hinton, AB (17:30)
Cold and sprinkly in the morning.
We did not have a good night of sleep last night. First the truck alarm went off a few hours after we went to sleep in the tent. We really have no idea why the alarm went off so after it happened the 2nd time we decided to keep the truck unlocked. Sometimes after that it started to rain as well, and it was pretty cold (probably because we are camping across the valley from the glacier, a giant ice field even!). I had to get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom and it was not very pleasant at all (not to mention it’s freezing!).
The weather in the morning did not look good either. We got up and had breakfast, went to the Icefield Center to get our tour ticket (10:30am bus) and walked around the Icefield center a bit waiting for our tour time. It was cold and rainy outside and visibility is not great. We got on the shuttle bus that took us across the road and closer to the icefield to board one of those Ice Explorer with big wheels.
When mom knew we will be going to Columbia Icefield she told me the first time she visited the icefield with the tour group they did not have to board the shuttle bus to get to the Ice Explorer, but on the second visit 4 years later they have to take the shuttle bus to get to one of those explorer buses. She thinks the glaciers used to be much closer to the road but as we pass those marker for where the glacier is at time in the past we didnt really see an indication on how far the glacier retreated. The Ice Explore has large tires (almost as tall as me!) and runs in very low gear to take us up to the Athabasca glacier. It was very cold and windy (and sometimes rainy) out in the open so I did not spend the full 30 minutes outside and went back to the bus early. David tried some 200-year-old ice water but I was too cold to think about drinking cold water.
After we got back to the Icefield Center we decided we should find out what the weather will be like (since it has been miserable all morning) for the next couple of days. We checked with the Park Canada staff at the Icefield Center and the weather is forecasting showers overnight and thunderstorms for the next days (and probably days following that). Asking the staff whether or not the weather forecasting is usually accurate here, their answer: “Your guess is as good as mine.” We decided since the weather isn’t going to improve we should probably just move on, there will be other time to visit the Canadian Rockies later since there are other parks we have not been to yet.
We went back to the campground and start to put our gears away. Lesson learned on planning too much without considering weather. We paid for the 2nd day of the campsite already and will not be able to get our money back for the unused day. After we packed up our stuff the weather got better and the sun is out. We begin to wonder if we made the right decision to pull up camp earlier but we already did… We had lunch at the picnic table and walked around the camp and check out the waterfall behind the campground. The campsite has an outhouse that is directly facing the Athabasca glacier, talk about a million dollar view.
As we drive north we get occasional rain but nothing to bad to affect the road condition. Our next stop is Athabasca Falls.We walked around the trail a bit and check out the waterfall. This is a popular tourist stop so there are a lot of people here.
By the time we get to the town of Jasper it was raining pretty steady and it’s very windy. It took us a bit of searching to find Park Canada office to get our refunds on the 3rd day of the park pass. I gave dad another call (as usual he knows exactly where we are) to tell him about the weather and our change in plan. We flipped thru the Mileposts to find possible location to stay near Hinton and read the ad for Hinton KOA. We’ve never stayed at KOA before but figured we can give it a try.
At the Hinton KOA we got a “Kamping Kabin” which is basically a cabin with beds (a full size bed and a bunk bed), TV and refrigirator, just bring your own bed sheets! The cabin we got looks pretty new, the folks at the front desk are very helpful and gave us a map to show where everything is in the campground & in Hinton. The campground has everything, shower, kitchen area with electric stove, laundary room and even campfire area. We showered and did our laundary and repack a few things in the truck. We also took the opportunity to fill up our water container with water from the campground.
It took us awhile to decide what we want for dinner because I think it was too much work to cook anything so we end up driving to Hinton and pick up burgers at A&W (and of course, root beer float!). We also fill up the truck then bring our food back to eat at the picnic table by the cabin. The campground has WiFi access but it is kind of spotty. We got some pictures downloaded to the iBook and David did a trip update and that took forever.
Distance today: 125.8 miles
FJ spotted: VB x1, SF x1 (by Hinton KOA, has a black roof), Iceburg (2008 SE) x1
Wildlife spotted: bear x1