From: Karen
Date: Wed Jul 20 20:25:03 MST 2005
Subject: Banffite for 3 days

Rod, Melissa's MisSteak was no mistake ;-) Our waitress had a great sense of humor and even gifted us a pan of sauteed mushrooms that got made "by mistake." Would you like me to pick up a baseball cap for you before I leave, or maybe a pair of Melissa's tights?? (Don't know if they make 'em in your size.) Also, we went to Coyote's tonight and were impressed there, too. It seems like the kind of food Janos would serve (not that I've been to Janos, just heard much about it over the years). Dad and I drove to Lake Louise today and hiked the 5+ km up to the Plain of the Six Glaciers. The hike starts with about a half a mile of mostly flat walking along the large blue-slate green lake. Gorgeous--and it was so smooth this morning--NewRyan, I'd have owed you a Mountain Dew :-)--. Then the trail takes you up past charcoal gray and brown 200-foot rock walls, popular with at least a dozen climbers. Then, up up and away, through lush pine trees and leafy bushes (unusual enough for a desert girl), through streams cascading over rock faces, alongside a swift glacial-fed river whose rapids we could hear all the way up. Twice on the hike, I could hear the sound of a piece of a glacier breaking off. Sounds a bit like a thunder, a bit like a big gun... When we got all the way up the trail, we stopped at a teahouse. Yeah, that's right--teahouse. It's a rustic two-story log structure built in the 1920s, whose cooks and servers cook on propane and hike down and back up again when they have to. The food is carried up by packhorse (whose evidence was amply left behind on the trail). So I sat outside eating my tuna on homemade bread taking in the sight of massive glaciers in three directions. Amazing!! Up and back down again, the most beautiful hike I've ever done (although Grand Canyon hikes and Sawtooth Mountains in Idaho have held high honors for years). On the way back down, I was on the lookout for hikers on the verge of giving up when they were much too close to quit. I came upon two Japanese girls trying to catch their breath and told them, "Gambatte (hang in there)...thirty minutes more" (giving a generous time estimate) "Thirteen, or thirty?" one of them groaned. "Thirty up, fifteen back." Their faces fell a bit. "It's really beautiful." On they trudged. The Begrudging Trudging of the Saints, I thought ;-)

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From: rodhugen
Date: Wed Jul 20 22:22:49 MST 2005
Subject: I'm thinking cap, not tights.

From: benjipark
Date: Thu Jul 21 06:19:00 MST 2005
Subject: huh?

From: Karen
Date: Thu Jul 21 09:40:34 MST 2005
Subject: Make puns, not war

From: Karen
Date: Thu Jul 21 09:39:24 MST 2005
Subject: Howling Wolf

From: Karen
Date: Thu Jul 21 09:58:01 MST 2005
Subject: Banff Y

I'm staying in the Banff YWCA which, like many Ys and hostels in tourist towns, is like a mini United Nations. Koreans fill the air with smells of ramen, Quebecois teens take turns skateboarding down the hall, Germans discuss their plans in the cafe, and French kids contentedly eat boiled eggs out of egg cups. (I have never even seen a kid eat out of an egg cup.) Dad & I have a private room but don't spend much time there except to sleep. He likes to read his paperback novels in the huge, comfy living room. I like to walk under the moon-backlit clouds or to watch people in the hostel. Last night, I crowded in onto the floor of the TV room to watch the last half of "Shrek" (which I haven't seen since it was in the theater). Missed my favorite scene in which Lord Fahrquart's castle was a satire on Disneyland. Saw one of the other faves, though, in which Fiona & Shrek made each other cutesy balloons out of a toad and a snake. The Y, an old, converted hospital, has wide hallways with heavy doors, and a little bit of the hospital smell still lingers. A little bit of the hospital spiritual vibe still lingers, too. Does anyone else know what I'm talking about with that?

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From: Karen
Date: Fri Jul 22 10:23:19 MST 2005
Subject: "It's a beautiful day..."

"...don't let it slip away." Yesterday afternoon's sky was cloudless blue. (Yeah, say the Tucsonans, so what?) Like Tucson, the town of Banff is surrounded on four sides by mountains, but the pines are much thicker, the mountains are closer, and glaciers are sprinkled here and there. Ahhhhhh. This is the prettiest national park I've ever been in. It's beautiful in a Mozart-Bach, Claude Monet kind of way. Compared with others: Grand Canyon is awe-inspiring, intense (like Beethoven or Chopin, Camille Claudel's sculpture) Yellowstone's geo-activity is just funky (forget classical music--think the Sgt Pepper's album--for visual art, probably Dali) Smoky Mountains are laid-back (Simon & Garfunkel, "Feeling Groovy," Renoir's paintings of people hangin' out) Mammoth Cave is big and dark but not scary at all unless you're claustrophobic (the Cure? visual art--oooooh, I dunno.... who did those really big canvases with simple planes of color? maybe Rothko...) OK, I'm taking my music geek self and getting out of this Y soon. (Mosquitos, be gone!)

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