Up to another beautiful sunrise this morning!
that just kept getting better!
Granola this morning and then a drive to the
trailhead for Boom Lake. It was cloudy
and an occasional spit of rain.
It was a
great trail – nice and wide where we could walk three abreast and at the
beginning pretty easy underfoot.
We did
hit some rocks and roots but never really bad.
There was the customary fairly steep climb in the beginning, but then
leveled out to a wonderful walk through the woods. Lots of mushrooms along here--very moist. The trail is usually covered in snow until mid June.
Great scenery when the trees allowed it!
We saw a Spruce Grouse in the woods along the
way.
End of the trail!
Gretchen's mascot made the climb also!
The lake was beautiful with a 600 meter limestone wall,
high
mountains with glaciers and
a huge rockslide at the end of the trail.
Gretchen and Dad rock hopped over to the other side of the moraine and
then followed a path out to a point where the lake took a turn while Jean
searched the cliffs for mountain goats…alas, none there.
Jean noticed bubbles in the water and discovered they were coming from between rocks in the water..gasses escaping I guess. We saw them other places also...fascinating. We had a chilly lunch with in and out spits
of rain and then headed back just after a relatively loud and large group
appeared on the scene. We had it all to
ourselves for quite awhile. Gretchen's in charge of hike selection while she's here and this was a fabulous start!!
Fruit on the solomon seal.
Then back
down to 1A and some sunshine! Headed into Banff and did a little shop wandering. One interesting thing we kept seeing all over...including on trails were these...
Inukshuk (in-ook-shook)
The sign in the store described them this way...
Inukshuk is an Inuit word meaning "in the image of man". For centuries Inukshuk have been known as guardians who direct travelers along the best and safest passage. They were originally built by the Inuit people to guide "those who follow". Inukshuk are made from stones of all sizes and shapes. These stones are piled on top of each other to form the shape of a person. There is usually one arm longer than the other which would indicate the direction to travel. Inukshuk came from the land and remain part of the land and each is unique. They are powerful symbols of the past and future paths to take. Today the Inukshuk has been adopted as a symbol to remind us of our dependence on each other and the value of friendship.
This was another interesting Banff feature--all the main streets had these manhole sized brass plaques with different animals and the street names on them. They were great!! Headed back to the campground and had dinner and then headed back out to see if we could find more elk...but none tonight. Another wonderful day!
