Lake Louise
Over last summer I took the family to visit Banff National Park. In fact we were there to attend the graduation of my nephew who was finishing the master's program from University of Alberta, Edmonton, in computer science. Now he is doing a PhD there, and so we contunue to visit when we can. After the graduation party, we thought we better take the opportunity to visit the Banff National Park that is nearby. We have visited both Banff and Jasper National Park earlier, but didn't get to spend enough time around Lake Louise.
Lake Louise is a very popular destination, and to top it off, there are not enough places to stay nearby. Even the nearby town of Banff, which is about 40 to the south of the little town of Lake Louise, doesn't have that many places to stay compared to demand. Therefore, the prices of vacation rentals and hotels are incredibly high over there compared to similar places in North America. So last time around we stayed at a vacation rental in Canmore, which is another 20 min away. That makes the 'commute' a bit much and parking stressful. If there are a lot of tourists at Lake Louise, which I seem to think 'always', parking is a big problem. Just near the lake, there is a small parking lot (I don't know, may be 100-200 cars), which is almost always full. When it is full, you must park at the ski area, across the freeway, and take a bus. All these adds a lot of logistics, and I thought, to hell with it! This time around I will stay at Lake Louise town itself! So we stayed at Lake Louise Inn.
It is a nice functional no-frill place with a indoor pool and a nice lobby. I liked the lobby a lot and spend a lot of time there, especially when it was raining and snowing. Rest of the time we mostly stayed outside around the Lake Louise.
There is a flat and easy trail that goes around Lake Louise. The trail is very nice in the evening, when most of the day tripper have already left.
On the far side of the lake, there is a inlet stream that comes into the lake. My kids spent a lot of time there balacing on the logs and playing with the water.
Also when you go to the far side of the lake and look back, the famous Fairmont Château Lake Louise hotel dominates the horizon.
Moraine Lake
During summer the 15 km narrow road from Lake Louise to Moraine Lake is only accessible by shuttle buses. That requires booking so more logistics. However, I am not complaining. When you do all that it probably one of the most beautiful places I have been. It was snowing when we got there so visibility was challenging, but kids still loved it.
It is a fairly wild place and I think the last picture shows it. Although this is a very well travelled place, but just a bit of bad weather takes most of the tourists away, and the place returns to its original beauty.
Happy Travels!
