Banff, Lake Louise, Jasper, Sun Peaks, Whistler and some bear sightings

The An early morning rise to explore the town of Banff and to ride the gondola up to Sulphur mountain, this is where you get the best views of Banff

Fairmont Sands Hotel Banff, the town of Banff is actually a national forest park, so that the people that lives there has to be working, no retirees 

Sulphur Mountain, another gondola ride.

Bow river falls

Elks just eating on the side of the road

The sceanery is just beautiful, see the reflection in the lake

Wolf Lake note how green the water is

Our grizzly sighting he was very under nourished

DH and I on the absenthe glacier

Cam our snow mobile driver, a fellow Aussie from Geelong.

Our black bear sighting, she also had a cub

Mount Robson

Cracking horse falls

Whistler, peak to peak gondola ride

Whistler summit.

What an amazing experience riding the peak to peak, we had three gondola rides, then came down the mountain in a chair lift, we were over 9,000feet. On our ride down we saw black bears and the snow and sceanery was once again beautiful.

At our hotel in Whistler is a chill room with over 100 vodkas on display, you are only allowed in for 20mins.

I actually celebrated my 60th birthday in Jasper, but was unwell due to getting a gastric flu, ten of us on the bus was affected. Tomorrow we will be going onto Victoria, Vancouver Island, where we will be staying for two days, Back soon with more travel tales.

Vancouver Island

The next morning,  after a very early start so that we may catch the 11am ferry to cross to Victoria after travelling a couple of hours, we arrived at the ferry terminal just in time to catch the 11am ferry, as we were booked on the 1pm ferry it was great to catch the earlier one, as when we arrived into Victoria we were gojng to the Butchart gardens, where we will spend a few hours. 

The sunken garden

The ferry ride took 1 3/4hours. After we drove off the ferry,  we arrived at Butchart Gardens where we all had a few hours to explore. This garden which was developed by Jenny Butchart in 1904, was initially a quarry, so the first part of the garden that was developed was the quarry and now called the sunken garden, the garden entails over 50 acres,  has 50 gardeners and is just a masterpiece, the gardens are still maintained by the Butchart family.
These gardens are well worth a  visit.

On our arrival to our hotel, bagpipes were played and we were made to feel very welcome. DH and I just loved Vancouver Island and all it had fo offer.

The next morning we went into the centre of town and explored the people's market,  china town, some thrift shops and off course a fabric store where I picked up some great american wildlife fabric.

We walked all the way back to the wharf and had lunch on the pier, met some fellow travellers, had a few drinks and walked back to the hotel, to get ready for our farewell dinner with our 47 fellow travellers. For tomorrow we set sail for Alaska.
This being our second tour in USA with Cosmos was great, at first I was hesitant 47 people on the bus,  but what a great crowd, mostly aussies and kiwis, we all had a ball, everyone got on, were considerate of others and a great time was had by all. This tour proved to me that big groups can work.
Alaska here we come.

Empress hotel

Peoples market

The wharf

Canada here we come.

Saturday the 17th saw us getting a cab to the airport, to catch our flight to Vancouver, the temperature in Las Vegas was 47 degrees, so very happy to leave.

 The flight was 2 1/2hrs, on arrival we caught a cab to our hotel and had a running commentary from our cab driver, about Vancouver and what is happening in Vancouver.
We sydneyites seem to have a lot in common with Vancouver, just to touch on a few gripes by our cab drivers, bike tracks being put in the inner city, foreign buyers, buying all the houses and leaving them empty.
There appears to be a lot of buildings demolished and new highrise being built in their place.
Vancouver does not appear to be preserving their heritage buildings.
The next morning we had a city tour and visited Stanley park, Granville Island and parts of the city.

The girl in the swimsuit in Stanley park, she is also a tidal marker.

Totem poles in Stanley park.

When we stopped at Granville Island we saw these painted concrete tanks.

My second quilt shop find on Granville Island, well actually I missed it, my kiwi buddies pointed it out, much to DH's dislike.

There was a light scatter of rain during the city tour, when we stopped at Granville Island for lunch,we were reassured that the rain would cease at 2pm.

We arrived back at our hotel at 1230 and left at 1320hrs to go to the Capilano suspension bridge and Grouse Mountain.

Entry to the suspension bridge, it is still raining.

DH and I walked across the bridge, very slippery.

View from the cliff walk, to the suspension bridge.

The cliff walk took about 10minutes.

View looking back from where we had walked.

After the bridge we were than driven to Grouse mountain, and it is still raining, but not cold.

We took the gondola up, and in 10mins we were up enjoying the sleet and light snow fall, I followed the bear tracks to see the grizzlys.

On the way we saw snow ploughs.

This is Grinder, the bigger of the two, Coola is the smallest, these bears were rescued as cubs and have been on Grouse mountain for 13 years

The bears weight charts.

As you can see it is still raining and light snow, the wood chopping event was entertaining, although it was wet we had a great day.

The next morning, it was all aboard for the Rocky Mountaineer, silver leaf as the gold leaf carriage was broken, money refunded, but I must say silver leaf was pretty special.

The Rocky Mountaineer was wonderful we had red carpet, bagpipes playing, three course meals, alcohol served from 10am and three delightful girls that kept us entertained. Our first day was 10 1/2hrs and we had an overnight stay in Kamloops.

Some of the sights from our train ride.

Inside the Rocky Mountaineer 

Our dessert at lunch time.

One of the first train stations, when the Canadian Pacific railway was built. Our second night was in Banff. We spent 14 1/2 hrs on the train travelling from Kamloops to Banff, this has been the only time that I have had to sew, as the touring has been at a frantic pace.

We arrived into Banff at 2100hrs, off loaded, said our goodbyes and checked into our hotel for the night. We were to spend two days in Banff, in the am, up to Sulpher Mountain.

More adventures to follow.

Las Vegas

After our grand canyon visit, where we stayed one night in Yavapai lodge, and saw the sunset, we all had a relaxing evening with wine and cheese. The next morning it was time to set off for Las Vegas.
This will be our third visit, but the first time coming in by road, we passed through Boulder City.
On our drive from the Grand Canyon we drove part of the way through Route 66, we had a stop over for an hour in Seligman, made famous by the local barber called Angelo, who was concerned about the new highway bypassing Seligman, so he went about making sure that passing traffic would stop and spend some money in the shops.

Angelo the barber

After our lunch stop, we arrived into Vegas at 4pm, and boy was it hot, stinking hot in fact. The
group was staying at Treasure Island. This was officilly the end of our national parks tour, so fond goodbyes and thank you's were relayed, friends made, until we meet again.

DH and I had three days in Vegas, we had our play prebooked for friday night, which we tried to see in 2012, but the show was having a break.

Treasure Island

The ship sinks on certain times.

After checking into our hotel, we went for a walk, the heat was very unpleasant,  so we decided to explore the hotels in the air conditioning.

When we visit Vegas we always go to the Bellagio to view what floral display that they have in their main foyer, this year did not disappoint, it was a tuscan theme.

Large topiary of lemons, the flowers are changed daily.

This plate was made of lentils and painted.

After visiting I felt like we were back in Sorrento again.

We also spent the day going out to old Las Vegas to enjoy the Freemont experience, never disappoints. There is a new container shipping yard with arty fart shops, boy did I have fun.

Freemont experience.

The fire spitting preying mantis.

Containers shipping yard.

Our Friday night show was circus Soleil "Zumanti", DH got more than he bargained for!

A great show

This concludes Vegas, onto Canada.