At the start of September, Kamala and I took a small vacation to Banff to be tourists and get out of town for a few days. Going to Banff is always a little strange for me since I lived there for 2 years. It's a nice place to visit but after two years there I had gotten my fill of it and don't have any desire to live there again. That's probably just me being overly cynical though; I do have some awesome friends there still and it is a beautiful place after all.
Since Kamala had not been there since she was really young we thought it would be a good place to go to relax since I could play tour guide and show her some of the cool places to see. We came up with a pretty packed list of places to see and restaurants to go to in the 4 days that we had off.
While we didn't get quite everything done on the list that we had we got pretty close. I wanted to show Kamala the waterfalls at Johnson Canyon since it's an easy hike with some awesome views. She wanted to check out Lake Louise and Moraine Lake. I thought we should go up the gondola for sunset and check out the Banff Springs Hotel. For some reason she really wanted to see mountain goats and sheep. I happened to know where there are pretty much always sheep hanging around that were used to people but not where there were any goats.
We also planned on doing a sunrise photo mission on Tunnel Mountain to get the sun coming up over the hoodoos but we couldn't get our lazy asses out of bed early enough. I think that may have been the only thing on our list that we didn't do so overall we considered it a successful trip.
The Schedule of What We Actually Did
Thursday:
- Leave Nelson early, stop at a few rest stops along the way to check out some sights going through Cranbrook and Invermere way
- Drive around Lake Minniwanka when we arrive in Banff before going to the hotel
- Check in to the hotel then walk around town
- Head to Athena Pizza for the best pizza in Banff and visit some old friends
Friday:
- Go to Johnson Canyon and hike to the ink pots
- Drive along old Bow Valley Parkway to Lake Louise
- Check out Lake Louise and Moraine Lake
- Back to Banff and go to Coyotes for dinner
Saturday:
- Go out for breakfast, shop in Banff
- Shop in Canmore
- Eat at Nourish in Banff (awesome vegetarian restaurant)
- Head up the gondola for sunset
- Walk around in the Banff Springs Hotel
Sunday:
- Head up Norquay to find some sheep to take photos of
- Go back to Lake Louise to see if we could get better pictures
- Leave Alberta and drive back through Revelstoke
![Somewhere between Radium and Castle Junction](http://www.blairaltman.com/sites/default/files/_MG_5522.jpg)
![Johnston Canyon lower falls](http://www.blairaltman.com/sites/default/files/_MG_5536.jpg)
![Johnston Canyon lower falls](http://www.blairaltman.com/sites/default/files/_MG_5546.jpg)
![Johnston Canyon upper falls](http://www.blairaltman.com/sites/default/files/_MG_5593.jpg)
![I like mushrooms](http://www.blairaltman.com/sites/default/files/_MG_5620.jpg)
![On our way to the ink pots](http://www.blairaltman.com/sites/default/files/_MG_5628.jpg)
![The Ink Pots](http://www.blairaltman.com/sites/default/files/_MG_5630.jpg)
![Kamala at Lake Louise](http://www.blairaltman.com/sites/default/files/_MG_5671.jpg)
![Moraine Lake glacier view](http://www.blairaltman.com/sites/default/files/_MG_5682.jpg)
![Moraine Lake](http://www.blairaltman.com/sites/default/files/_MG_5688.jpg)
![Kamala scared to death on the Banff Gondola](http://www.blairaltman.com/sites/default/files/_MG_5707.jpg)
![A view worth scaring Kamala for](http://www.blairaltman.com/sites/default/files/_MG_5725.jpg)
![The sunset just kept getting redder](http://www.blairaltman.com/sites/default/files/_MG_5766_0.jpg)
![last bit of sunset](http://www.blairaltman.com/sites/default/files/_MG_5774.jpg)
![Sheep on Norquay](http://www.blairaltman.com/sites/default/files/_MG_5785.jpg)
![Sheep on Norquay](http://www.blairaltman.com/sites/default/files/_MG_5786.jpg)
![The ferry just past Revelstoke](http://www.blairaltman.com/sites/default/files/_MG_5830.jpg)
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