Day 4 - July 13, 2010 7:00 PM

July 13, 2010
7:00 PM

The adventure in Jasper continues.
Rain, rain rain and more rain. Not just rain but pouring rain at 6 degrees Celsius, which of course means snow up the mountains.

We woke up to rain at 8:00 and decided to let everyone sleep as our plans would not work well in rain. We finally got everyone out and about at 12:00 PM.

We went to the "Soft Rock Cafe" for the all-day breakfast then spent an hour or so shopping the many, but much alike tourist shops of Jasper. We loaded up on some baked goods from the Bear Paw bakery and headed out.

Our goal was the town dump. We had heard that's where to go to see bears in action. We drove the 15 minutes or so to the dump to find that it is now a controlled gated dump. We then headed back toward Jasper.

We decided to take a side trip to Malaigne canyon and Malaigne lake road. This is a 44 KM windy road. We almost immediately saw a fox eating some type of large rodent.

As we continued up the road, the snow became more and more think on the edges of the road. At one point we stopped at a viewing point and the boys built a 4 foot snowman. We then continued upward with the snow continuing to get worse and the rain/sleet continuing to fall with an outside temperature of 0 degrees Celsius.

We decided to turn around at about the 20 KM mark as we noticed our gas supply was of a concern to some people in the car.

On the way back, we had an encounter with a 10 point elk. The elk remained about 20 feet from the road quietly stripping a tree of leaves for around 15 minutes. Several cars backed up along the road as we all watched.

We stopped at Malaigne canyon in the pouring rain and walked one of the suspended bridges which cross the canyon in several places. This one was directly over a waterfall.

We made it back to town with enough gas and went back to the hotel. D returned from the front desk with the news that the road we were on was rated as poor winter driving conditions. Poor winter driving conditions on Jul 13?? It's probably a good thing we turned back.

B and P opted to go and find workout facilities at an associated hotel to ours. B and J opted for the hot tub.

At 7:00 the electrical power at the hotel went out. The hallways are extremely dark. Some light comes into the rooms from outside, even though it is a very cloudy day. B and P returned with the news that the work out facilities consisted of 2 broken machines and that the power is off all over town. We now wait to see when the power gets restored.