Here's a quick video to show the terrain and (lack of) people at Blacktail. Pretty awesome place!

Kim found a National Bison Park just south of Hungry Horse, well, a few hours south of Hungry Horse but well within striking range. As such, we headed down and took a look.

As usual, part of the park was shut for the winter but we still had a major area to look around in. We're getting used to National Parks being shut so it was no big surprise!

 

Kim found a few antlers

Buffalo!

Antelope

Blacktail Mountain is Kalispell's local ski mountain, it's small but very cheap and very fun. There's only three big lifts, but the snow and the terrain were amaaaazing. I was lucky enough to have had six inches of powder falling over the previous two days and, since most of the locals are skiers not snowboarders, the ungroomed runs were largely untouched.

The lifts were empty, the sky blue, the sun shining and there was fresh powder to plough through. It doesn't get much better than that!

Sadly I forgot to take my memory card, but I did buy an disposable camera which I will develop eventually. Photos to come eventually!

Edit : Here's the photos!

Powder! Powder!

Busy, busy, busy :)

Entry to the powder park

At the bottom of the powder park

 

We took a drive up to the dam in Hungry Horse, it was surprisingly impressive and we even saw some wildlife on the way!

 

We took a drive to the Glacier National Park, sadly the main route, the Highway to the Sun, was closed after only ten miles. Nevertheless, we took a drive through postcard land and took a few amazing photos.

The cabin we have is amazing, set into the woods but with all the amenities you could want. (including wireless internet!)

They have a couple of really nice dogs too :)

 

The deck

The office/kitchen

Kim says hello

 

On the 12th March we left Jasper and headed south through the Rockies on our way to Hungry Horse, Montana. We booked a couple of nights in Lethbridge on the way to break up our trip, as we weren't sure how long it would take us to cross the border to the USA.

Driving down through Banff National park (and Banff itself) was amazing again, the Icefield Parkway lived up to its reputation as being an amazing highway to drive down!

Lethbridge was a fun stopover destination, the scenary change we encountered was remarkable. Southern Alberta has an effect called the Chinook winds where the wind crossing the Rockies increases and then warms up as it drops down to the plains. This means that much of southern Alberta is free of snow! We really felt like we were entering cowboy country, the buffalo signs and place names were like something from a movie, and we were constantly stopping to have a laugh at the unusual names and sights.

Lethbridge itself was a moderately large town and we managed to catch another ice hockey game, this time from the stands so we actually saw the strategy part of the game rather than the up-close and bloody version.

The USA border took us some time to cross, but they allowed us in after 40 minutes of waiting around (we were the only people crossing at the time, I can't believe it took so long) Our first impression of Montana was a bit of a shock, the roads hadn't been cleared of snow for some time and the road signs were actually covered by the snow! The first few towns were closed for winter, so I was quite glad that we had plenty of petrol left and could take our time.

Sadly the road throught the Glacier National park, which we had planned to use, was also shut for the winter so we had to take a massive detour around the south of the Park. We made it easily enough and moved into our new cabin in the woods!

 

The Weeping Wall, in Banff National Park

Ridiculously picturesque scenary in the Rockies

Southern Alberta

 

Huh? Apparently this was the First Nations' prefered method of hunting buffalo before horses were brought over. Chasing herds over a cliff and letting them fall to their death. Nice.

 

Made it!

And this road sign is for.....?

Yep, we're in the USA!

The Icefield parkway is named for the famous Glaciers that line the route, the Athabasca glacier being the most famous as it comes to within a km of the road. So we took a trip down to have a look.

When we got there, we found that looking at a snowy covered glacier against a snow background was a bit underwhelming, I guess it's a summer destination usually!

Despite this, the drive was amazing as the scenary is truly spectacular. You quickly stop taking photos as the scenary is just always spectacular, so it's hard to figure out what is a stand-out!

The athabasca glacier

Road side scenary

Jasper is obviously also known as a ski destination, so I took a day to explore Marmot Basin, the local ski mountain.

It is simply amazing, not very big but beautiful and fun. The car parks are all ski-in/ski-out, you ski down to the lodge and pay for a lift ticket.

All the people I talked to were either local or from Edmonton, and there were plenty of good conversations on the lift. (a few eyebrows were raised when I told people how long I'd been in Canada) Eventually I made it up to the high point of the mountain where I found big, thick untouched powder that was simply amazing.

I did have a slight problem when I took a wrong turn and hit some rocks, luckily I had my helmet on and a very well padded jacket! I eventually climbed out and carried on.

Simply a fun and inspiring day!

The crowded slopes

The local kids having fun

Fantastic for scenary. Just breathtaking all the time.

The Icefield Parkway through Jasper National Park and Banff National park is one of the most scenic roads in the world, so we had to go and explore.

Near Jasper town are the Abathasca falls, along with a few other 'pull overs', so we went for a drive and saw some sights.