01.-12.08.2007: Calgary - Kananaski Mountains - Banff NP - Grand Prairie - Dawson Creek - Fort St. John Our last week in Calgary was spent cleaning and tidying up Winnie and working frantically to get our website finally up to date. We also watched rental videos - Anna asked for a recommendation for something funny and got the most boring film ever!! She took it back to complain and got another one out. At least it was a bit better! On Monday 6th August we said a tearful goodbye to Anna and drove off. We really enjoyed our time there and it felt like we were leaving home! Our first task was to go hunting for a weather radio which uses satellite to give you weather reports in your area, 24 hours a day. It would be very useful to us particularly in Tornado Alley. But everywhere we went, they had either never heard of such a thing or didn't have it. We drove to the western outskirts of Calgary to see Heidi and Jacques who we met 18 months ago in Mexico. They have a 5 star Condo and we were treated to an excellent barbecue, with onion soup to start, followed by kebabs and lamb cutlets with potatoes and fruit salad. We ad a great evening discussing travelling plans and the Yukon until nearly midnight. The next morning we were treated to "Budwig" which is a Swiss style breakfast of powdered grain, yoghurt and honey. At 10-30 am we set off behind Heidi and Jacques and drove to the Kananaskis, one of the best kept Canadian secrets which is right next to the famous Banff and Jasper National Parks, but even better!! We had a bit of a problem when Heidi and Jacques didn't see us turn off the freeway and thought we'd missed the turn. We hadn't, but then they had to go to the next exit and come back!! We did a 6 hour walk up to Lilian Lake and on to the Galatea Lakes. It was a really good walk but we noticed that we haven't done any walking for a month and it showed, particularly on the steep parts. We stopped for lunch and Heidi realized that she had forgotten to bring bread, so we swapped a cheese sandwich for some of her yummy home-made flapjacks and zucchini bread (see recipes). We definitely got the best end of that deal!! When we got to lower Galatea Lake, Jacques turned around. The two of us and Heidi walked on up to the upper lake. Heidi has been here twice before and never made it to the end, so she wanted to get there this time. After reaching the upper lake we took a different route back down to the lower lake which ended up being extremely steep and treacherous. Kirsten fell in the gravel at least once! We met Jacques at the lower lake and then headed back down to the trailhead. We were all exhausted after approx 12 miles of hiking and then we got treated to an ice cream! A super day. Heidi and Jacques had to get back so we said goodbye at 8pm and drove to a spot that Jacques had told us about, at Dead Man's Flat where we could park for the night. The next day it was raining which gave us an excuse not to do any more walking - neither of us was capable anyway!! We drove into Banff National Park and went to Lake Louise. The place was packed full of tourists despite the rain!!! Our alcove window started leaking again and we found that we have two cracks in the glass. So when (or if) it stops raining we will have to repair them. We carried on driving along the Ice Fields Parkway and stopped to do the short steep walk up to the viewpoint over Peyto Lake. We drove out of the park at Saskatchewan Crossing and found a place to park up. Then we found out that we have a new leak - through the light above the bed!!! So even more bowls needed to catch the water!! On Thursday we drove back into the park and went for a walk on the Athabasca Glacier. We could walk in our new boots without any problems on the ice and we went quite a long way up the glacier. It was freezing cold on top but the small streams were a wonderful turquoise blue from the minerals. We decided to walk back and then along the edge of the glacier to go and see if some of the ice was falling off. But we forgot that the edge of the glacier would be very muddy. The ground looked hard but when Kirsten stepped onto it, she sank up to the tops of her boots and quickly did an odd sort of two-step dance to get herself back onto solid ground!! We wished we'd had the video with us!! Kirsten spent the next 10 minutes trying to wash the mud off her boots (which have now been proven to be waterproof!) and we heard the crack and crash of ice cleaving off the edge of the glacier. Of course, we couldn't see it from where we were!!! We drove up to Jasper and out of the park. We parked at Wal-Mart at Hinton, did some shopping and then sealed the alcove window cracks and sealed the Kayak roof rack where we thought the water was getting in through the light. We drove up to Grand Prairie the following day which took us 5.5 hours. We used the free internet at the visitor centre and found out about showers at the leisure centre. When we drove there, there were at least 10 other motor homes parked on the car park, so we joined them for the night! The next morning we paid $1-75 each and went for a shower. We did a big shopping at Superstore as this would probably be the last large town until we got to Whitehorse in the Yukon which would probably be a lot more expensive. On the way north we stopped for a photo at the "World's largest beaver" statue and then got to Dawson Creek and the start of the Alaska Highway and took a photo of Milepost "O". The Alaska Highway was built in 1942-3 as a transportation route for the army to protect Alaska from a possible Japanese attack. The attack never happened but the road remains and has become a famous route for travellers. The road is continually under repair and has been straightened so that it is now some 35 miles shorter than the original. It is still 1,422 long to Delta Junction in Alaska and 1,520 miles to Fairbanks, the unofficial end! The next "world's largest" was a very unimpressive golf ball - the things people do to get on the map!! And then the World's largest beehive which was just 3 oblong glass cases (approx 4ft by 3ft and about 3 inches thick) full of bees and honeycomb. We had expected it to be in the normal shape of a beehive and so the oblong glass cases just didn't make the grade! At least they had marked the queen with a spot of white paint but she looked the same size as all the rest so we suspected they had just stuck the paint on the nearest bee so they could point it out to the dumb tourists! It was raining again, as it had been virtually since we left Calgary so we parked at the Wal-Mart in Fort St. John instead of driving any further. At 4am in the morning, Helen got woken up by ice cold water dripping on her neck from the light!! We went to the visitor centre and then spent a really frustrating time trying to get the right tyre pressure into our tyres. It took us nearly one hour!!! Then we went to Safeway and bought some cake to cheer ourselves up! We drove further north along the Alaska Highway and found a spot at Beaver Creek for the night. The temperature dropped down to about 4°C!!