Crid's 1999 Grand Tour of Canada

3 weeks travelling by train from Toronto to Vancouver

Day 14 (Friday) - Jasper (Angels on Aspen B&B)

After a fairly small breakfast of croissant, apple, yogurt, fruit juice and cereal bar (left outside the bedroom, eaten in the bedroom), I decided to have a lie-in.

Watched some TV.  Finally got up around 9.30am and wandered downtown.  I ended up in the A&W burger outlet and sampled one of their hot-dogs (since we don't have them in many fast food outlets in England).  Not bad at all.  I was suitably fuelled for the rest of the day.

Phoned home.  Visited the Tourist Information Centre and found how to get to the Jasper Tramway.  A tour operator called SunDog Tours run a minibus from the railway station to the base of the Tramway.

There was a powercut while we were driving to the Tramway.  It affected the whole of Jasper.  Power was restored about 10 minutes after we got to the Tramway.

The ride on the Tramway takes 7 minutes.  The view from the top was stunning.  I used about 15 minutes worth of video tape up there.

Despite the signs telling people not to feed the animals, people were feeding the squirrels at the top of the mountain.  Consequently they are incredibly tame.  I had two come right up to me to see if I had any food.  At one point I had one sitting on my shoulder.  They didn't get any food from me though.

Returned to the bottom after spending about an hour at the top.  It was surprisingly warm up there today - provided you kept out of the wind.

Back in town I found an Internet Café called Soft Rock Café.  Spent about ¾ hour on IRC talking to some of my English friends in #elsewhere and #30+.

My original plan for tomorrow had been to visit the Columbia Icefields.  But it turns out that Brewsters don't run a tour to the Icefields from Jasper.  (This is despite the sign at the station saying "Columbia Icefield Snowmobile Tours", and the fact that there was a Snocoach parked in the parking lot outside the station).  If I had a car I could drive down there, but it's still quite a long way.  It's closer to Banff and Lake Louise, which is where the tours run from.

In the evening I found a nice restaurant called Something Else.  There were several Greek dishes on the menu, but I decided to have the Jambalaya.  I was a little surprised when a pasta dish turned up, as all Jamalayas I've had were rice-based.  It was nice nonetheless (rather spicy though).

This afternoon was cloudy, and there was even a little bit of drizzle.  Let's hope tomorrow is better.  Still, it's better than the East coast.  They've had a tropical storm!

The Rocky Mountaineer was in the station this evening, so I sneaked a quick look.  The seats look pretty far apart, which is a good sign.  Should be as comfortable as VIA Economy.

Yesterday was a day of encountering Brits.  Today was a day of encountering Germans.  Everywhere I went today, there were groups of them.

 

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