May 31, 2013 Waterton Park toward Alberta

May 31, 2013  Rocky Mountain High

Another early start, headed for Waterton, which is Canada’s part of Glacier.  The Chief Mountain Parkway was limited to vehicles 21’ and less – for a reason.  It was a windy, hilly road with a constant view of amazing snow-capped mountains to the west.  We arrived at the Border Crossing a few minutes before it opened, but breezed through with no problem.

 We entered Waterton immediately and drove a while to the Visitor’s Center, which was just before the small town of Waterton.  Great friendly rangers made a few suggestions and we were off in the drippy, misty day.  We first took the Akimina Parkway to Cameron Lake.

We started off spotting a doat (not a typo), a kind of mountain goat and then saw several deer.  And then that brown spot along the road turned out to be out first bear sighting! - a black bear, which are kind of cinnamon colored here.

 

Cameron Lake was home to many water fowl, ducks and geese, as well as noisy stellar jays, and had quite a bit of snow around.  We took a short hike and headed back toward town.  We saw a pair of big horn sheep close to town and when we drove down into town we found many more hanging out in a particularly tasty (we assume) yard!  

We had lunch at Zuma’s eatery and used their WI-FI for a little while.

Next we took a drive toward Red Rock Canyon, and saw two more bears close to Lost Horse Creek; a mother and cub.  The Canyon was lovely and we walked a trail that gave us fantastic views. Lots of wildflowers (too many to post).

Left the park around 3:30, heading for Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump.  Unfortunately it closed as we arrived, though we did get to read about the history and see the cliff over which the buffalo were driven.

We stopped at a small town called Granum and asked the proprietor at a small store if he knew of a place we could boondock.  He said we could park  down the street from his store, where trucks sometimes parked.  So we spent the night here – and picked up a strong, free Alberta Wi-Fi signal!  Caught up on emails and a little bit of blogging.