Wed Sept 18th – Banff on a rainy day
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| Banff National Park Museum - Built 1903 |
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| Cave and Basin Sulphur Spring - outside pool |
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| Inside the Cave |
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| Banff Park Museum Built 1903 |
Last night it rained and
today it continued. But undaunted we set out for Banff to explore indoor
activities and went first to the Banff Springs Hotel and had a quick look
around but opted to go to Timmy’s for coffee and D and L’s new favourite
Canadian Maple donut. We followed this with a visit to the Banff Park Museum.
This was a surprise and very interesting. It is about 110 years old and has
preserved examples of the animals and plants to be found in the Banff park area
dating back to 1860. There were also lots of stories about past explorers and
Park Commissioners and several hundred really interesting photos from the past
100 years. Quite fascinating. The story of Banff is sad in some ways as humans
came in and destroyed much of the natural resources of the area, but it is also
gratifying to know that the ravages stopped when the park became park of the
National Park system. We then decided
that, since we bought an annual group pass to National Parks and Historic sites,
that we would go to the Cave and Basin historic site.. what a surprise that
was. It was the site of the first finding (by Railway employees) of the Sulphur
Hot Pprings. They tried to commercialize the springs, but after some measure of
success it was taken over as part of Canada’s National parks and protected for
future generations. The cave, containing the original hot springs pool, while
reeking to high heaven is still fascinating and Parks Canada have created a
great information centre with informative videos and photos about the area. We
walked around outside before realizing that most of the day was gone and we
headed back to camp feeling superbly knowledgeable and satisfied with a great
day.
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| Elk at our campsite |
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| Just picture perfect |
