In the morning, we were once again out of bed bright and early, to get ready to go hiking.  We were planning to hike the Valley of the Five Lakes Trail, one of the most popular hiking trails in Jasper Park; but to do so, we needed to be there as early in the morning as possible, to beat the crowds.  Or, at least that was what we had read in our guidebook.  According to Don't Waste Your Time in the Canadian Rockies, the Valley of the Five Lakes Trail is a nice hike, but only during the "shoulder season", when tourism is at its low point.  Otherwise, it isn't even worth it to hike there.  Being early risers, our hope was that we could hike the trail before the rest of the tourists were out of bed.

That said, we were out of bed and on the road by 7:40 a.m., which put us at the trailhead at 8:00 a.m.  And when we arrived, there were only three other cars parked there.  Not bad at all!

We began our hike with a short jaunt through the forest, where we kept our eyes open for wildlife along the way.  John was still on the lookout for a moose or a grizzly bear, two animals that we had not seen yet, but we didn't find either one of them - just lots and lots of squirrels.  By that time, the "SQUIRREL!" line from the Disney-Pixar movie Up! was getting old, but Mary kept doing it anyway.

After a quarter of a mile, we came to Wabasso Creek, where there was a newly-constructed bridge spanning it.  It was so new that it still smelled like freshly-sawed wood - plus, the lumber from the old bridge had not yet been removed.  John and Mary raced across the bridge, to see who could make it to the other side first; I shook my head and followed at a normal pace.

On the other side of the bridge, we encountered a German couple who had just completed the loop and were on their way back to the trailhead.  They indicated that the hike was disappointing and wasn't very scenic at all; that wasn't good to hear, not when we were just setting off on it.

At that point, the trail began to climb steeply up to the top of a ridge, gaining roughly a hundred feet in less than a quarter of a mile.  Along the way, we met another couple - a young man and woman, who were hiking out.  Mary was quick to point out that the woman was wearing flip-flops.  Seriously!  She wore flip-flops to go hiking!  I realize that they're the latest trend and everyone is wearing them these days, but why oh why would anyone want to wear them hiking? 

Once at the top of the ridge, the trail then descended towards the trail junction, where the loop began.  Here, we had the option of taking the loop clockwise or counter-clockwise; based on the trail description John had read, he learned that it was better to go clockwise and see the five lakes in order.

The trail took us into the forest and meandered in between lakes one and two.  As we made our way through the foliage, John suddenly stopped in his tracks when he saw what he thought was a mushroom running away through the underbrush.  He thought he was losing his mind until he realized that it wasn't running by itself; it was being carried away by a squirrel.  It made us think of yet another Disney-Pixar flick, Ratatouille; we wondered if the squirrel needed a bit of aged, smoked gouda to go with his mushroom - maybe a little oregano, too?

From the second lake, the trail began to follow a ridgeline, high above lakes three and four.  Along the way, we encountered a third hiking party - a whole family this time - who were hiking the loop counter-clockwise.  They had just seen Canadian geese at the third lake and wanted to make sure that we saw them, too.  They were still there when we arrived, and we were able to zoom in on them for a picture.

At the end of the fourth lake, the trail dropped down and took us in between lakes four and five.  The fifth lake was the biggest lake of all, and, to me, was the prettiest, so we stopped there to take a break.  Along the shoreline of the fifth lake, we found two rowboats, chained up to trees and locked up with big padlocks.  Apparently, these rowboats were available to rent, perhaps at the Wabasso Campground nearby, but we weren't sure.

As we left the fifth lake, we entered the forest again and started climbing up the ridgeline.  Along the way, we found a sixth lake - or more like a pond - in the middle of a field of tall reeds.  It wasn't visible until we were about fifty feet above it, on the trail. 

Soon, we reached the trail junction, where we completed the loop and started back towards the trailhead.  John told us to keep our eyes out for a giant fir tree that could supposedly be found on that leg of the trail; he had read that it was the largest and oldest fir in the entire province of Alberta.  Towards the bottom of the hill, we did find a very large fir; we weren't sure if it was the one, but it was certainly the biggest tree of its kind in that area!

At the bridge, we met a young family - mom, dad, two young girls, and a friendly dog - on their way up the trail.  That could only mean one thing: the traffic on the trail was just getting started, so it was time for us to finish the hike and get out of there.  Sure enough, as we made our way through the forest, on the last quarter-mile of our hike, we started seeing the first of the crowds, including one lady with an annoying collection of bear bells on her hiking stick (which was taller than she was).  It made me think of the old joke, about the way to tell the difference between the scat of the black bear and the grizzly; the grizzly bear scat is the one with the bear bells in it.

We finished the five kilometer (three mile) hike at 10:15 a.m. - in just over two hours, which was excellent time for Mary.  Once we had all of our hiking gear loaded in the car, we drove back to the cabin to eat lunch - and to figure out what to do with the rest of our day.  We now had all day to kill and nothing else planned.

It wasn't long before John had an idea.  He had found another short hike for us to do - this time, to Beaver Lake, a total of 3.2 kilometers (or 1.9 miles) roundtrip.  It was an easy hike, as it was mostly flat, but it would be just enough to get us moving, so that we would be ready for our backpacking trip in the morning.

The trailhead for the Beaver Lake Trail is located along Maligne Lake Road, at the eastern edge of Medicine Lake.  When we arrived, we found that there were very few cars in the parking lot; this was a good sign that we might very well have peace and quiet during our hike...more or less. 

The trail followed and old fire road, which paralleled Beaver Creek, 1.6 kilometers to the lake.  Although it was very easy to hike, there were a few short climbs that were enough to get us huffing and puffing - especially Mary, who was already tired from the morning's hike...and now she had to hike again, at 1:00 in the afternoon?  There were times that she was dragging, even on the flat trail; so we had to make it interesting for her by playing Tag while we hiked.  That, at least, got her giggling!

After a quarter of a mile, we came to an old homestead.  There were two buildings - a main house and what appeared to be a shed - and it looked as though they were still in use, as there were plants hanging on the porch.  There weren't any signs posted around the property, nor where there any fences, so we were left wondering who lived there, and were they home?

At the end of the trail, we came to Beaver Lake, a small and shallow lake that is fed by Beaver Creek.  Like the fifth lake along the Valley of the Five Lakes Trail, there were boats chained up to an old dock on the southern tip of the lake; but, in this case, there were several rowboats and canoes as well.  We assumed that these, too, were rentals, as they had the name of a company stenciled on them; but we weren't sure how one would go about renting them.  There was, however, one boat missing; we could see it on the other side of the lake, with two occupants inside.

While we were standing at the boat dock, John discovered that there was a small game trail that traced along the eastern edge of the lake.  He suggested that we take it, to see if we could make it all the way around the lake.  We only made it about a tenth of a mile, though, before we were forced to turn back due to a log jam that completely blocked the trail.  It was a good thing that we turned back anyway, because the grass was just tall enough that we didn't really want to be out there without gaiters or long pants on.  Mary was wearing long pants, but John and I were not; and we certainly didn't want to find any ticks on us.

We lingered at Beaver Lake for a little bit, enjoying the silence and taking pictures.  Except for the people in the boat, on the far side of the lake, we had the place to ourselves, and it was nice to enjoy a little bit of solitude for a while, considering the crowds we had seen everywhere else. 

Around 2:00 in the afternoon, we started hiking back to the trailhead - a feat that we accomplished in about thirty minutes, during another game of Tag.  By that time, there were clouds beginning to gather in the sky, and it seemed like rain was imminent that afternoon.  That was certainly going to be a welcome change to the weather!

It was still very early in the day when we arrived at the trailhead; so John suggested that we kill the rest of the day by taking a scenic drive on the Yellowhead Highway, in search of more animal jams and adventure.  I shrugged; that was certainly fine by me!

As we made our way down Maligne Lake Road to the junction with the Yellowhead, we encountered our first animal jam of the day.  It was caused by yet another caribou, who was grazing in the grass in exactly the same spot as the one we had found yesterday.  It was hard to get a picture of him, though, because there were people standing right in front of him.  Yes, you heard right; they were standing right in front of him, like he wasn't going to suddenly become annoyed by their presence and start head-butting them with his enormous rack.  We just had to laugh at these people, because despite all of the warning signs about how elk and caribou are dangerous, they still tempt fate by doing stupid things like that.

Once on the Yellowhead Highway, we came across two more animal jams - one for a caribou, and another for a huge family of big horn sheep.  Though we were always fascinated with these animal sightings, I could tell that John was getting impatient about not seeing the two animals that he wanted to see: the moose and the grizzly bear.  We continued to keep our eyes peeled in hopes of seeing one of those two elusive animals.

Just a few miles east of Pocahontas, we came to the Jasper Park east gate.  As soon as we left Jasper Park, we noticed that the landscape gradually began to change.  Eventually, the mountainous terrain gave way to rolling hills, then to flatlands, as far as the eye could see - we were no longer in the Canadian Rocky Mountains. 

After driving for a half an hour, we arrived in the town of Hinton, AB, where we stopped to use the restroom and fill the gas tank for the return trip to Jasper.  While in Hinton, we noticed a sign at an interchange: "Scenic Route to Alaska - Follow Alberta Highway 40".  Naturally, this piqued our interest.  Although we knew that we didn't have a prayer of driving all the way to Alaska that afternoon, we at least had to drive two or three miles, just to say that we had been on the "Scenic Route to Alaska"!  Perhaps someday we'll actually take the entire route, when we have the time to do it.

We didn't go any further east than Hinton that afternoon.  Knowing that we still had a lot of packing to do that evening, we turned around in Hinton and started heading west again, towards Jasper.  As we drove, the skies finally opened up on us, and a cooling rain came pouring down.  It continued to pour, even once we were back in our cabin, preparing for our backpacking trip; we just opened up the doors and windows and let the cool air in!

Around 6:00 p.m. - after the rain had let up - we left the cabin in search of dinner.  We weren't quite sure where we wanted to eat yet, but we had been tossing around the idea of eating at the Fiddle River Seafood Restaurant in Jasper.  It seemed only appropriate, since we were going to be backpacking to the Fiddle River in the morning.

As we came around the corner onto the main street in the town of Jasper, we noticed that there was a large crowd gathered on the berm, overlooking the railroad tracks.  "Quick!" John exclaimed.  "Pull over and park!  That has to be an animal down there!"

And he was correct!  In the distance, lurking in the trees on the other side of the railroad tracks, we spotted a large brown object, slowly lumbering across the ground, and we knew right away that it was a bear.  One of the other tourists passed around a set of binoculars, and that was when we discovered that this was no ordinary bear; it was the grizzly bear that John had been waiting to see!  He was huge and brown and had the hump on his back that distinguished him as a grizzly.  Finally, a real live grizzly bear, not in captivity...and there we were without a camera!

As the grizzly moved through the trees, we suddenly realized that there was another large object there as well.  John borrowed the binoculars again and saw that it was a very large elk, with a gigantic rack; and the elk was staring down the grizzly, as if daring him to make a move.  The grizzly, of course, knew better than to attack the elk; he assumed a defensive stance, about ten feet from the elk, and stared him down as well. 

Those of us on the berm waited; what was going to happen next?  Was the elk going to head-butt the grizzly?  Was the grizzly going to swipe at the elk?  The two animals stared at each other for what seemed like an eternity, neither one moving...until finally, five minutes later, the grizzly turned away and slowly huffed out of the trees and towards the railroad tracks.

Upon seeing the grizzly cross the railroad tracks, many of us - myself included - took our children by the hands and prepared to make a break for our cars, should the bear come any closer to the berm.  After he had crossed over two of the four tracks, we started to believe that he was actually going to come into town - and I'm sure that would have wreaked havoc among the tourists.  The bear, however, turned one more time and began following the railroad tracks out of town, much to our great relief.  As he disappeared from view, we all turned away as well and headed back to our cars; the show was over, and it had ended well.

We were still excited about the grizzly bear sighting as we went into the Fiddle River Seafood Restaurant, which was located on the second floor, above the bar.  From our table, next to the window, we continued to watch the berm to see if another crowd was gathering, but by then, the show was definitely over.  We did see a helicopter take off from the helipad near the railroad station and we wondered if it wasn't the park service, out to make sure that the grizzly was truly heading out of town; but we'll probably never know.

Our dinner at the Fiddle River was simply exquisite - and so was the service and the wine!  We were glad that we decided to go there after all, because it turned out to be the perfect send-off for our upcoming backpacking expedition.

After dinner, we immediately returned to our cabin, to finish packing and to turn in for the night...for in the morning, we were leaving civilization behind once again...

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