Wednesday 24th August: 4 Bear-Jams and an Elk

Oh my we are soooo lucky today. Our first bear-jam (any traffic queue in these parts is for a bear or other wildlife as it was last year in The Smokie Mountains) of the day, this one is a mum and 2 cubs and it's still only 10 o'clock 

Sorry this one is blurred and I'm sure with Photoshop we can sort it out but we want to publish asap and with bear-jams you take what you can get !! He/she was such a cutie.....

Our first stop (apart from the bear-jam) of the day, Maligne Canyon. This is a very deep very narrow canyon at the top, not the easiest to get good pics but I'm quite pleased with results. Quite a lot of people about as an easy stop for coach tours but plenty of space for us all and by the time we have walked down to the bottom of the canyon there are just the hardy few !! It is a gradual downward slope and when the trail goes down of course you have to climb back up.....

Lots of spray at this bridge over the canyon

The build up of the river is from many small falls and water seeping out from the rocks

We have coped with suspension bridges in the past but we hope this is not a bridge !!!!

Very dramatic as the canyon starts to widen out

After this fairly flat part of the trail that runs along the edge of the canyon we turn slightly "in land" onto the really steep part !!

At the bottom of the canyon we veer off on the loop trail and after we are half way up a half km very very steep climb, which has to be a 1 in 3 or at least as steep as parts of the Great Wall that we climbed, we remember the park ranger at the information centre saying to do the trail in reverse to this so we would have gone down the very steep part !!!! ho hum !
This pics doesn't really convey how steep it was but we made it and needeless to say we only passed 2 other walkers on this trail and they had obviously listened to the park ranger !!

Well worth the climb, good views from the top of the ridge

Our next stop is Medicine Lake. In summer Medicine looks like any other lake in Jasper National Park but by October the lake vanishes, replaced until Spring by a shallow stream winding sluggishly across mud flats to a few small pools. The water's depth varies as much as 20m through the year, much of the time the lake has no visible outlet. First Nations believed the disappearance of the lake was by "big medicine" and they were fearful of it. It is in fact an underground cave system that empties the lake into the canyon

Second bear-jam of the day........

Maligne Lake, a very pretty lake. On our drive here, about 30 kms, the mountains have all been very rugged and dramatic. The road ends at Maligne Lake

Our lunch stop, several chipmunks performing.....and no we did not feed him although some naughty people were. Perhaps they haven't seen the many signs everywhere asking you NOT to feed the wildlife.......

Third bear-jam.......

My goodness an abundance of wildlife today we now have a goat-jam.
Just as well the speed limit is 60kph, although the signs are all beware of caribou

Wait for me mum !!!!

The top of Medicine Lake where the water is starting to recede, it starts mid/late August

The fourth and final bear-jam of the day.
This was in the same spot as the brown bear we saw earlier so we assume same one..

We were lead car on this side so were able to get some good shots......from inside the car of course !!

And this time an elk-jam.........

The last one of the day a ram-jam !!! A very majestic chap.

Another really good day.........so much wildlife in one day and some beautiful scenery to boot