Lake Louise, Alberta

April 8th - April 12th, 2005

After a day trip there in the winter of 2003, we'd really been aching to go back to Lake Louise and actually stay at the Chateau Lake Louise. The Chateau, along with the nearby Banff Springs Hotel, is one of those old grand castle hotels built as the Canadian Pacific Railway pushed west through the Rockies to the Pacific. The hotels are loaded with history and the surrounding scenery is nothing short of breath taking.

Our original plan was to break up our time between ice skating on the lake and skiing at the nearby ski area. An early warm and dry spell, however, put a bit of a damper on those plans as the rink was closed for the season. The lake was still frozen enough to walk across and the ski area was still open. We did ski for one day but the conditions were pretty bad.

Even with all of that though, our main reason for the trip was simply to bask in the glory of the area in and around Lake Louise and that we did. We spent some time hiking around the lake which was glorious and also spent a day driving from the Chateau up to the town of Jasper. That drive alone was worth the price of admission.

Next time ... we go back in the summer.