24 August 2016, Wednesday

Josh, the owner of Rocky Ridge B&B, which is down the road from Mountain View Inn, is keeping an eye on things for the owners of Mountain View. They were called away unexpectedly to Calgary. Josh asks if we would mind coming to his B&B for breakfast. Of course we wouldn’t. We wake early so we can get there by 7:30, the appointed time. It’s a beautiful morning on the plains. The sun is shining. Not very far to the west we can see the imposing peaks of the Rockies, their heights shrouded in clouds.

Breakfast is delicious. O and I share orders of blueberry pancakes served with herbed scrambled eggs, and french toast stuffed with cinnamon cream cheese topped with caramelized apples. I tell Josh about Tin Pan Galley and favorably compare his breakfast to theirs. He plans to look at their menu on-line to get some new ideas.

After breakfast we repack Jazz and head west. It is a short drive to Waterton Park gate. After a brief stop at the visitor center to get oriented, we drive up Red Rock Highway to Crandell Mountain campground and book into site J-17 for 4 nights. By 11 am our tent and tarp are set up.

Now we drive back to Waterton Village to book a shuttle for our planned hike on the Carthew-Alderson Trail on Friday. This year the Canadian government is paying for the shuttle so we get a free ride! Thank you P.M. Trudeau. The shuttle will drive us up into the mountains, and then we get to hike 20 km back to Waterton Village. We choose Friday for the hike as it is supposed to rain tomorrow. (I should mention that most of the hikes O and I choose to do while in the Canadian Rockies are chosen with the assistance of the book, Don’t Waste Your Time In The Canadian Rockies : The Opinionated Hiking Guide by Kathy Copeland and Craig Copeland. It’s a great guide book and every trail recommendation is spot on both for beautiful scenery and for degree of difficulty.)

We decided last night, after looking at the weather report, that a rainy day would be the perfect time to have Jazz’s oil changed. We’ve driven almost 5000 miles since leaving home.  We have an appointment back in Lethbridge at 10 am Thursday.

After booking our shuttle and doing a bit of end-of-season sale shopping, we wander the streets to see what food offerings are available in Waterton. We stop for a snack at Waffleton. O has a banana-nutella waffle, and I have a ham and cheddar waffle with maple syrup. We find a cafe where we can get sandwiches for our hike and another restaurant that seems a likely place for dinner afterwards. Before leaving town, we return to the visitor center for a brief, but steep, hike up Bear’s Hump. From the top there is a beautiful view of the village, Waterton Lake and the surrounding mountains.

We return to Crandell Mountain campground and prepare dinner. Just as we are finishing up we hear chatter at nearby campsites. There is a bear nearby! Our neighbor quickly ushers his children into their camper. Several people are standing in the road by our site watching the bear through the bushes. She is munching berries about 3 sites away, unconcerned by the people watching. I pack all our food back in the car. O has the bear spray in his hand, as does one of our neighbors. We all watch quietly from a respectful distance until the bear ambles off. This is our first campsite bear encounter. I try to get some photos, but all I get is bear ears through the bushes. That’s fine with me.  Our campsite is cleared of all food now and the bear spray will remain at hand. The evening temperature is dropping quickly as the sun goes down. As we are preparing to enter the tent we hear a loud rustling in the bushes next to our picnic table. The bear is back, and closer! I hear a second bit of loud rustling. Could there be two bears? A friendly looking park employee emerges from the bush carrying a large staff with orange streamers. He warns us about the bear. We inform him the bear just passed by. He is trying to shepherd the bear away from the campground. Off he goes into the surrounding trees calling “hey, bear!” O and I retire to the tent with our bear spray.