On the 20th September we picked James (Carig's workmate/friend) up from the airport and drove to Jasper, Lake Louise, Banff, Canmore, Edmonton, Kelowna, Golden.

Jasper: Wasn't what we expected, although a nice little town. Went up on the Tramway and walked to the summit to see 360 degree views and look down on Jasper.
Hostel was kinda crappy, especially for a tourist destination.

On the way between Jasper and Lake Louise is the Icefields Parkway. We got to walk on the Athabasca Glacier which was incredible!!

Lake Louise: Gorgeous place, not a lot to do (as in one tiny wee community village), but one of the nicest hostels we stayed in along the way. Peyto Lake, Moraine Lake and Lake Louise were all incredible sights, with Moraine being my favourite. A photo doesn't capture the crazy colour that it was!!

Banff: Really nice (although touristy) town, reminiscent of Queenstown (or a bigger Wanaka). We didn't really get a lot of time to look at the sights, but we visitied the Banff Springs Hotel (MASSIVE) and went on a drive to find wildlife (only saw a couple of Elk on the Golf Course).

Canmore: A neat surprise to us; best hostel, decent supermarket (most other towns didn't have even one!) and all-round relaxing town.

Edmonton: We made a split decision to drive up to Edmonton to experience the world's largest mall, and also to see where Jimmy's parents used to live.
The mall is, well, big and has many a thing that probably shouldn't appear in a mall (ice hockey rink, water park, hotel, proper restaurants and a sea lion). Was fun to window shop in the designer areas, and came out with not too much money spent!

Golden: We spent a night in Golden to break up the journey back to Vancouver. In the morning we went to the Wolf Education Centre which was very educating and a great experience. They have 6 Wolves there and also Karelian Bear Dogs, which are used to "push" stray bears back out of human civilisation into the wild.

Back to Vancouver to drop James off and carry on our touristy adventures...