Rocky Mountains- here we go!

Report by Viktoria d.K.

Rockies – here we come!
My trip to the Rocky Mountains began on a Thursday afternoon at 5.15, when we almost missed the ferry to Vancouver. After a 2-hour ride we finally arrived in Vancouver and could start our 8-hour drive to Lake Louise. While we were driving it got darker and darker until you couldn’t see anything anymore, not even your hand in front of you. Before we started, everybody told me how beautiful the road into the Rockies would be, but well, I couldn’t really agree… I mean, I just saw darkness, nothing else :)
We drove until 4 a.m. before we found a hotel, which was still open AND affordable. It name was Deer Lodge and I felt a little bit like being one of the main actors of one of the “Hostel”- movies, who always get killed first…

Accommodation in the Rockies

In other words, the lodge was really scary and also really weird (at least by night). But THANK GOD we made it to the next day alive :) We woke up at 8 a.m. (yes! It was a really short night) and when I looked out of the window, my mouth fell open! I’ve never seen such an astonishing and amazing view before (by then). Big mountains with white snow-covered hilltops surrounded us.
During the night, the temperature dropped to –8° Celsius and I almost froze to death in the cold car, when we drove on to Lake Louise.

Lake Louise itself was so beautiful, I can’t really find words for describing it. I’ve never seen such deep and turquoise water before. And with the sun shining down on the lake, the water looked even more turquoise. We then hiked up to get to Lake Agnes, which took us about an hour. On our way up, we came by Mirror Lake, which is supposed to look as beautiful as Lake Louise, but it looked more like a frozen and muddy puddle on that day :)

Lake Louise and Lake Agnes

Up at Lake Agnes we went into the “Tea House” to get something to drink. The hot chocolate and the coffee tasted really bad, and I would not recommend drinking anything else than tea there, but the Apple Crumple was just a tasty explosion in my mouth!
After this more or less delicious brunch, my boyfriend and I just couldn’t stop hiking up, so we went on to hike up the little beehive. It was a 360° view and I could see just every mountain there is in the Rockies. I can’t really remember all of the mountains names, in fact I actually can’t remember just one name, but the view was just stunning and breathtaking! It took us half a day to hike up and down the mountain, and our next stop then, was the little and beautiful mountain city Banff.

Beautiful Banff

While we were driving to Banff, we made a stop to have a look at the Takkawakka Falls, which are one of the biggest waterfalls in Canada. The water is falling almost 200m down!
Banff is one of the most beautiful cities I went to here in Canada. Even though it’s small, it is full of life and has many attractions! We had a nice hotel room, which was way to big for only 2 people, but I love being “decadent” :)
On our first evening we went out for dinner (as we had no kitchen in our room – that was the only option…) to the Grizzly House, where we had a 4- course- dinner. We started with salad, went on to a vegetable fondue, had a hot stone with the best meat ever and had a chocolate fondue for desert. It was perfect! But really expensive… And worth it :)
The next day we went to the Columbia Ice field and went onto the glacier with one of those huge busses. It was really cold and super windy! The guide us told to cover our faces or we will get frostbites within 5 minutes…

Mistaya Canyon

After the Ice Field we made several stops while we were driving back “home”. One stop was the Bow Lake, as impressive as Lake Louise, but not as turquoise. Another natural spectacle was the Mistaya Canyon, which was maybe not as big as the Grand Canyon, but it was deep and scary as well.
On the next day, our last day, we took the Gondola and went up, so have a look at Banff as a whole. It was really impressive and super cold! The wind was so hard up there, it almost blew us away :) Up there I finally fell totally in love with Banff and if it would be possible for me I would definitely move up there! But, for a Computing Science student or a Web designer there is no work. But nevertheless I will never forget Banff and will come back not just once.