Up the Kicking Horse Pass to a stay at the Chateau

You can tell right away when you hit the Rocky Mountains.

The Rockies shoot out of the ground, sharp, jagged, and steep. Through the Kicking Horse Pass from Golden to Lake Louise, they surround the highway and are an impressive sight. Just as impressive is the emerald blue-green glacier water that runs in the rivers. There are really no words to describe how beautiful it is.

We've also been snake-bitten with the wildlife scenery.

Until today, we had not really seen any interesting wildlife (other than some ospreys and eagles through the Fraser Canyon, which were actually pretty cool). Right out of Golden, we saw several mountain goats relaxing next to the highway. Their horns were something else, and realistically we probably shouldn't have stuck around so close to them, but they were really calm so it didn't seem like a problem. And FINALLY we saw a black bear. He was seemingly grazing for food just off the railroad tracks, it was too bad we couldn't have seen him (a bit) closer up. We couldn't believe it took this long to finally see one.

The Kicking Horse Pass was much like Rogers Pass, a straight up climb about 800m the whole way. What made it particularly hard were the headwinds we fought all day, and after passing through our FIRST provincial border, we finally made it 85km to Lake Louise. When we got there in the late afternoon, we assumed we would find a campsite. They were all closed, and the nearest one was 27km away.

We were looking at our options when I remembered I had asked my parents to try and get us a stay at the Chateau Lake Louise. You just never know! I hadn't checked my Blackberry all day, so I figured it was worth it.

Well thank goodness I did.

I had voicemails and emails telling us we had a free stay at Banff Springs. Not much good to us in Lake Louise, but after a quick call, the Chateau was willing to do the same for us.

After a gruelling 4km trip up there, we got into our rooms and hit the hot tubs right away. It is an absolutely beautiful hotel, and our rooms overlook beautiful Lake Louise. We are incredibly lucky to have the opportunities we've been afforded to date.

Tomorrow we'll go to Canmore to stay with family friends before stopping in Calgary the next day for a day off. It looks like we'll be getting some media as well!
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