Jasper National Park

Took the Discover Jasper tour today.
I somehow like Banff better than Jasper. It is a busier place, with a lot more people; normally I would have liked Jasper better but there is something about Banff; it is at a higher elevation, and it is more majestic!

Anyway, back to Jasper. It started off as a fur trading outpost and then developed into a prominent tourist destination. The place is pretty small, about 3500 permanent inhabitants. Very quaint little town, with the typical charm associated with it - town hall, post office, small houses with porches and gardens. as yet unspoilt, and gives the impression they are trying their best to keep it rustic!

So there is a whole bunch of stuff named as 'Maligne' (pronounced ma-line) here - a lake, its associated canyon, even a mountain peak. Seems a Belgian priest travelling in Jasper before the roads were built had a torrid time there, and so named everything Maligne - French for 'wicked'!! (His boat overturned into icy winter lake water and he almost died, so I don't blame him!) So back to me - went on a cruise on the lake to a little island in the middle called Spirit Island, from where there is a spectacular view of the lake laced by forest and bordered with mountain. Personally, I got (and am) quite sick of pine! Quite monotonous.

There was another lake called Patricia Lake on the way. It has an interesting history. During World War II, British ships were being torpedo-ed left right and center so there was the need for an outlandish idea to overcome that. Somebody from a mental asylum (!) - actually an Oxford graduate who landed up in an asylum - had the idea of building a ship of ice, which will not burn! So a prototype of that ship was built at Patricia Lake; the project was not successful, but gave a lot of insights into 'ice physics'!

Overall nice day. To top it all, we saw black bear and elk too, which was great. And a mountain that looks like the profile of an Indian chieftain lying down!