Day 4--Random (13-OCT-16)

Today was sort of a random collection of places.  We took a leisurely morning, and then got going.  Along the winding route, we found a few goats who considered the road as much theirs as ours.  It was curious and funny, but also a little concerning.  They clearly had no fear of people, which is not likely a good thing for their long term well-being.

Goats.

And more goats!!

Cave pool.

We continued to “Cave and Basin”, a place where sulfur waters percolate up through the porous rock into a pool within a cave.  Once, this was a sacred place to the locals, but as the Canadian Pacific Railroad came through, it became a good reason to lure wealthy tourists.  So, they cleared out the cave of stalagmites and stalactites, and built a pool in it.  Since this pool is the habitat for some rare snails, we were admonished to not touch the water (anymore).  So, now people pay money to go look at a pool.  There was a museum at the place with a lot of history about the beginnings of Banff as a tourist destination in the 1880s, and its history since.  This included a lot on the Internment camps around Canada from 1914 to 1920, and again in the ‘40s.

From there we headed back to Banff, and had lunch and wandered around the town (looking for post cards, souvenirs, etc).  There was a golf course that Ce & Charles found yesterday with a herd of 40 or so elk, so they brought us there to see if any were still around.  We saw about 15 or so, far less than the storied 40, but still quite a sight!!  They were lounging on the golf course, which could not have made the groundskeeper happy.  I’m imagining Bill Murray from Caddy Shack.

Bow Falls

We headed over to Bow Falls.  Compared to some of the falls we saw, it was much lower, but significantly wider!!  Since this is heading into winter, this is the slowest the falls would be, but they were still impressive.  Equally impressive was the rock formation around it.  The strata of rock was pushed up at almost a 75 degree angle with the horizon, and formed a splash guard on one side of the river, and a rough edge on the other.  The landscape clearly erodes away, and the trees cling to the rock for dear life.  Under one of them, you could see light directly under the trunk.  Another had a thick root that was exposed for perhaps 30 feet or more, until it found the ground.  It was quite a life line!!

Very long root!

Finally, we decided it was time to head for home.  Almost there, Charles chose to head off on a strange hike through the woods near our place.  So, I joined him and we struck out into the wild unknown.  Well, it was wild and unknown to me, at least.  Along the way, we found a quaint bridge across the stream, and another log bridge.  We also came across a guy with a gun, hunting elk, who proceeded to heckle us for the Texas Rangers losing the game the other night.  We finally found our way home, and played some cards and visited and relaxed!

Very solid, well built bridge!

Not so solid, minimally build bridge.  With Charles.