Day 5 of our summer vacation did not start out very well. Hubby’s blackberry woke me up early beeping with an email notification. (We may be on mountain time, but the blackberry is on eastern time!) Then daughter’s alarm went off at 5:15 a.m. because she was going to take a shower, but then she decided she didn’t want to. Arghhh!!! What I wouldn’t give for more sleep! Oh well… Finally went downstairs to take advantage of the Days Inn’s fabulous daybreak breakfast. Sorry. That was sarcasm. Not much of a selection, so I opted for raisin bran. sigh… Drove to Patricia Lake and Pyramid Lake in Jasper National Park.
Pyramid Lake
The plan had been to go canoeing here this morning, but of course now my darling daughter is too tired. Well, frankly we all are, and we’re all a little cranky this morning, so we decide to drive over to check out the Jasper Lodge instead. Things don’t get any better here either, since we’re having problems trying to figure out where to park. Hubby finally dropped me off outside the entrance. I went in, looked around – very nice place, but I was just not in the mood – so we left. Decided to drive to Maligne Lakenext and I realized that it was time to get over the bad mood and make the best of things. Good decision, because Maligne Lake is beautiful!
Maligne Lake
On the way there, the road followed along a rushing river of rapids – we found out later that this was the runoff from Maligne Lake and the level was the highest it’s been in 10 years due to heavy snow during the winter and heavy rain during the month of June. I should mention that this was the first day where the sun was shining brightly – lots of blue sky. Perfect weather, a little chilly, but by lunch time, we could finally ditch the jackets. Decided to take a 90 minute lake tour, which included a stop at an island where we took beautiful pictures of mountains, glaciers, etc. My daughter may be partial to Moraine Lake, but I would go back to Maligne Lake in a heartbeat.
Glacier surrounding Maligne Lake
View from the island on the Maligne Lake tour
After a BBQ lunch of hamburgers and hot dogs, we drove to Maligne Canyon, an area that has been worn down by swirling, rushing water from the nearby glaciers.
Maligne Canyon 
Bought gas and headed southwest to British Columbia - had to endure some more rain along the drive, but the sun came out again, and we made it to Clearwater by 6:30 pm. (we’re now on Pacific time, so we gained an hour!) We’re staying at the Clearwater Lodge – nice place with two queen beds, a sofa, refrigerator, sink, cupboards, bathroom with automatic light. We ate dinner at The Painted Turtle, which was located on a pretty lake. I had Portobello mushrooms with tomato & feta cheese – delish! Tomorrow, we head to Vancouver.
View from The Painted Turtle restaurant
