A stay in our first National Park in Canada – and quite a location …
Waterton National Park is right on the USA border and in fact links up with Glacier National Park in Montana which we also visited on our 2015 tour.
Drive to Waterton Lakes National Park
We filled the car with gas – quite cheap at C$1.85 a litre – and set off for the days drive. Again a slight need for adjustment and calculation going from gallons to litres and also only being offered a rounded $ option for the fill up option but managed not to overfill the tank !
The drive scenery was similar to the last couple of days and Adrienne had found us some interesting stops along the way.
At the town of Frank, we stopped at the Frank Slide exhibition. Frank was a coal mining town. In April 1903 at about 4am one morning, a massive rock slide down nearby Turtle Mountain sent over 100 million tonnes of rock through the eastern side of the town killing about 90 people.
It wiped out the coal mine and the Canadian Pacific rail line and generated such force that huge boulders and rocks metres deep were actually pushed up the opposite hillside – and are still there along with many of the dead who were never recovered. It is one of the largest and the most deadliest landslide in Canada’s history. A very interesting stop !
Continuing along Crowsnest Highway (Highway 3) we visited scenic Lundbreck Falls. The river and falls have exposed various geological layers from over millions of years.
We arrived at Waterton National Park about 4.00pm and we are staying at the lodge known as the Prince of Wales Hotel. It was built in 1927 and given the name by the Great Northern Railway company more as an inducement to get the then Prince to visit – but to no avail.
It is built on a bluff overlooking the lake above the village. It is an extremely windy location and the hotel is said to have been blown down 3 times during construction.
We were checked in by an Aussie girl from near Wagga and were told there were a few other Aussies on the staff ( we found quite a few Brits as well). The Stewart Tartan is prevalent with most of the male staff wearing kilts.
We had a couple of drinks in the lounge bar overlooking the lake then ate dinner in the main Royal Stewart Dining Room and our server, a local girl, told us that both her parents had worked there previously and her father had actually been part of changing the name of the dining room – which was previously called the Garden Room.
Dinner was excellent – leek croquettes shared then roast chicken for Adrienne and bison stroganoff for me. After dinner we heard the last part of a historical talk in the main lobby.
The park shows the scars from severe wildfires which came through in 2017 – I remember reading about it at the time as the fires also threatened Glacier National Park further south which we had visited in 2015.
The hotel and village were saved but the hills and mountains stripped by the fires which now, in many places, are covered with burned bare trunks. Whilst regrowth is evident, it will take decades for the native Douglas fir trees to reach mature forests.
A Day in Waterton National Park
Our weather has continued to favour us since leaving Seattle with bright blue skies, only a little haze, and low 20 degree temperatures – although it has actually felt much warmer.
We had a hearty English Breakfast in the dining room as we had a day of walking planned.
First stop was at the edge of the lake looking up at the hotel – essentially the picture in my poster at the beginning of this post. We then topped up with gas – even cheaper here at C$1.55 – using an old “on / off” bowser nozzle to pump the gas which I don’t think I have ever done before!
It was then about a 15km drive through the mountains to our first walking trail at Cameron Lake. This lake is extremely sheltered compared to the main lake and is a popular spot for canoeing and paddle boarding.
We chose a trail which goes about 1.7km down one side of the lake – actually just short of the point where the lake spills across the USA border.
About half way along we met a group coming the other way who said there had been a bear just along the trail. We then shortly came across 2 ladies stopped on the trail looking up the hillside amongst the scrubby undergrowth and burnt tree stalks.
“Have you seen the bear ?” They said pointing up the hill and as we looked we could see the furry brown butt of a bear disappearing down a gully. No time to get a photo of course!
One of the ladies indicated she was not keen to go further but the other said she wanted to go on to the end and we said we would be happy to walk with her – she looked more “bear seasoned” than us 😂
So off we went and despite a large deposit of bear scat we had no further bear encounters along the way. We did have quite a conversation with the lady who was from British Columbia- about her travel experiences and she was interested in ours. Turns out she’s had a few bear sightings in her time ( and the main thing lives to tell the tales 😂).
Turns out her parents had lived a few “winters” for them at Yamba in NSW many years ago and she had visited one year.
Funny how you slip into a conversation with someone – from the bear encounter – and then cover quite a spectrum of topics as we did the rest of the trail together – but we didn’t swap names.
She was divorced, similar age to us (I guess) , lived in BC, rode motorcycles, fairly regularly travelled with the other lady ( who she did refer to as Judy) towing their own little campers. After probably an hour of walking and talking and another quick chat with Judy when we found her on a bench waiting when we got back, we exchanged pleasantries and went our separate ways again.
Anyway, where was I …. Oh yes, after our Cameron Lake encounter we drove back toward the hotel then out to another section called Red Rock Canyon, again about 15km from the hotel.
The canyon has been eroded over time through oxidised iron rocks giving it the predominant red colour but with other coloured layers in some sections. Not far along another section we found Blakiston Falls.
All through our walking, whilst there has been some regrowth of new trees you couldn’t help thinking about how long it was going to take for the area to recover to its original state. It seems that some are concerned that it has had quite an effect in reducing visitor numbers – coupled with Covid. Looking at numbers it seems visitation was previously around 500,000 per annum which would put it in the bottom 15 comparing it to the US national park numbers.
After Red Rock Canyon we went back to the Waterton Village and first went to look at Cameron Falls at one end. We then walked through the town to a point on the lake looking up to the hotel on the bluff.
In 2011 Parks Canada came up with an idea to put 18 sets of red Adirondack chairs in lesser known but still stunning locations in their parks. It spread and there are now more than 100 locations. The point in the village we walked to had a set.
We made it back to the hotel and before heading inside walked down a path to a little inlet where we had seen another set of red chairs. Two sets down but I can’t see us taking this on as our next adventure! 😂
It had been a long day of walking and it was nearly 4.00pm so we decided a couple of drinks and easy dinner in the lounge was the way to end our day. Adrienne had a tasty buffalo burger and I had a roast turkey sandwich – both excellent!
We next head into the Canadian Rockies with Banff our first stop.