Breakfast today was by far the best we had the whole trip - I had grapes, pancakes, and crispy bacon. The oatmeal with brown sugar was temping, but I already had a plateful. After breakfast, we loaded the coaches for a half day of touring and and an afternoon off in Jasper.
The first stop brought a new look to the Rockies - a canyon with a beautiful river cutting across river rock, tall pines concealing much of the sun but allowing individual beams to shoot down. We walked along the trail of Maligne Canyon and caught new sights along every turn. This was the highlight viewpoint of the day for me.
The second stop was a quick photo opportunity at Medicine Lake. This is an odd lake that drains into underwater caves and drains underground. The glaciers melt and pour into this bowl in the spring and by fall the lake is down to small braided river channels. The First Nations were baffled by this and assumed it was something to do with bad medicine, which is how they originally earned its name that was later shortened to Medicine Lake. The sun was real bright this morning and the mountains almost fad into the distance, but the water was a nice shade of green and smooth as glass.
The last stop earned it's name - the Wicked Lake. Well, it's actually the Maligne Lake, but Malign means Wicked and it sure was. While it was pretty and I'm sure enjoyable for other visitors - I was miserable. The entire North American population of mosquitos was on vacation at Maligne lake and swarming around us. I swatted back and forth trying to take in the lake, but finally gave up and went inside and had ice cream. The ice cream was fantastic - a Rolo, carmel ice cream with a carmel center dipped in chocolate, but the mosquitos were miserable. Then to top it off, somewhere at this lake my sunglasses disappeared. I don't remember taking them off or putting them down, but some how I made it back to the bus without them. I'll be fine if I don't ever make it back to Wicked Lake.
The coach dropped us off in the downtown area of Jasper for some lunch and shopping of course! Uncle Lenox, John and Ginger all found our way to North Face Pizza for a delicious lunch. Uncle Lenox and I split a medium pizza and it had a great crispy crust with gooey cheese. After lunch we hit the shops where I found my purchase of the trip - new coasters. I know, it doesn't sound that thrilling, but they are beautiful dark slate pieces that will look soo pretty on my table. I going to add a little mountain look to my house - a crisp pine green, dark slate, pebble grey and my dark wood. The coasters are the first step! I also finished off my gift-shopping as well. I hope everyone likes what I picked out!
We made our way back to our bungalow at 4pm and had some time before dinner to relax and read in nature. I had a nice 30-minute nap as well after I read outside for an hour. We went down to the hotel restaurant for dinner and then spent the evening outside as a family. We watched Cailyn and the boys play horseshoes, I'm blogging outside with my power cord coming out of the bathroom window to my chair outside and I'm about to stop for a roasted marshmallow - one of my favorites! It's a wonderful evening and I have a feeling we'll be having a scrabble re-match this evening. We all had to hear Zeke gloat all day about using all 7 of his tiles on quarries last night and winning the game. He's going down.
Editors Note: Zeke did have a good game of scrabble - he played words such as movie, gazebo, infinite and his game winning quarries. He would like this added to today's post and he does another victory song and dance. Uncle Lenox would like me to add that we had to tell Zeke how to spell each of his words.
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