We headed for Lake Louise – the shortest day’s travel so far (well, other than those days when we’d not travelled at all!), initially by heading for the Cave and Basin museum on the edge of Banff, where some CPR workers taking time off from Railway building “discovered” hot springs. It was also the first National park in Canada, so they’d got a display about the development of National Parks in Canada, moving from areas where First Nations people were completely banned from hunting to today when they’re closely involved with the development & maintenance of them.

Next stop off Highway 1a (the old highway, a much more pleasant drive than the main Highway) was Johnston Canyon, we walked up it as far as the lower falls. I’m fairly sure that was the same place as I’d been to when we came in Winter & it was frozen – and a location for an Ice Walk.

Then, it was heading up to Lake Louise itself. Pretty packed to say the least, though once we’d left the lake front, and headed up towards Lake Agnes Tea house, it got a lot less busy! It was a 3.4 km hike – with a height gain of 368m, so the afternoon tea was very welcome. Less welcome were the local critters, Ground Squirrels and Grey Jays, who clearly didn’t agree with the notices pleading with humans not to feed them – so resorted to stealing. They

were pretty nippy – take your eyes off your food for a nanosecond and they swoop. We lost half a scone to a Jay, the women on the next table lost the same to a squirrel.

By the time we’d got back to the lake, the crowds had diminished slightly, but the clouds had lifted, so giving a much better view. Our hotel was a small, heritage lodge immediately behind the Chateau, so an easy stroll for our post dinner Cosmopolitan.