Mileage Today: 184 miles Total Mileage: 5,238 miles

Woke up to a beautiful sunny day, definitely cooling down – barely reached 70F today but in the sun it felt warm and the sunshine was gorgeous.

We set off on Rt. 1 The Trans Canadian Highway, east to visit Glacier National Park of Canada. It was about 40km away. It was a terrific drive really once we got used to the road being a bit busier than we were used to. Also, a big difference we have noticed here in comparison to the US roads is that there are very, very few pulloffs. This is so frustrating in such an incredibly beautiful area because there is nowhere to stop and enjoy it. And even more frustratingly, where there were pulloffs, they had views of precisely nothing, either because they were in a concealed place or because trees had been allowed to grow up and completely block the lookout. Weird. However, it really is a lovely drive – great green peaks with snow topped rock peaked mountains behind you just have to largely enjoy it from the car.

We went to the visitor centre in Glacier which is on Rt. 1 and it became apparent that in fact Glacier is a wilderness which you can really only view either from Rt 1 or from the trans Canadian train that goes through it. To be fair there are a few trails that lead up into it, but they are very steep and very long, far too much of an endeavour for us. We drove on east to the very edge of the park and a little further till we could see the snowy tops of the Canadian Rockies in the distance. We toyed with going onto Yoho NP but it was just too far, so we turned back and decided to go to Mt Revelstoke NP today for hikes. We plan to visit the Canadian Rockies proper in the future and we can see Yoho then. We bought a day pass which covers all the parks today and until 4pm tomorrow. It was about 16$ for 2 seniors.

Mt. Revelstoke NP is just outside of town and is accessed up a long winding, switchback road – hallelujah with pullouts – which has trails coming off it. The road ends 1km short of the summit. All the literature says there is a shuttle bus from the end of road carpark but apparently this hasn’t run “in years”…. We therefore had to walk up.

It was a very nice walk up through the woods and across small alpine meadows. A very good trail, although pretty steep and of course you are at altitude. We must be getting used to it though because we didn’t puff too much.

Up at the top which is fairly flat with a rounded summit, we did two short walks to fabulous viewpoints and then we did the trail that loops around and up to the actual summit. It was really nice and the views were stunning in all directions. We had great views of the Columbia River flowing through Revelstoke valley and on its way onwards through BC and to Washington and Oregon.

We got back to the carpark at about 4 and then down the winding road again, stopping at a couple of viewpoints, both looking west over the Columbia.

Did a couple of loads of washing tonight and we watched another episode of Rings of Power.

I’m sure we’ll feel the walk tomorrow but will probably go back up there to do some more.