My last post was the best day of any sabbatical. Today might be the oddest. We checked out of the hotel at the Lake Louise Inn this morning. We had a great room with bunk beds in the kids room, a loft for adults (and some kids by morning of course), living room and kitchen. We packed and loaded up the car to make our way to Jasper via the Icefields Parkway. The Icefield Parkway is one of the most scenic mountain drives in the world. It's extremely remote with on...

Today we woke up and ate breakfast in our room before heading to our Parks Canada bus to visit Lake Louise. Whitaker was especially excited about riding on the "big bus" since we saw many of them yesterday. We arrived at the lake and found it very beautiful and also extremely crowded. We enjoyed the view and took a few pictures and then we were off to find our trailhead. The Lake Agnes Tea House trail was not recommended about a week ago due to being in an avala...

This might be the best day in the history of our sabbatical adventures and it certainly is the longest. Our day started with the alarm going off at 3:30 am this morning to catch the sunrise shuttle to Morraine Lake. The kids did surprisingly well getting dressed hours before their usual wake up time and we were at reception for our 4:10 pickup. The van was full of people who boarded even earlier in Banff. The road to Morraine Lake is closed to personal vehicles ...

Today we tried to sleep until people woke up. So of course Liam and I were the first to get up. Once everyone was up we grabbed breakfast in the lobby and packed up the room, which is no small feat for our crew! We set off to Johnston Canyon, one of the most popular hikes in Banff. I read that it could get super busy, so I was expecting the worst since we didn't get a very early start. We were pleasantly surprised to find parking right away, so we headed out. T...

We had a sleepy group this morning after a late night of s'mores roasting and the excitement of being in the mountains. But when Keely plans a trip, there's no time for sleep so we were up and downstairs eating breakfast first thing in the morning - we even had to wake Odin and Whitaker up! Breakfast in the hotel was great and the kids were all fascinated by the "Pancakes in One Minute Machine" which dropped two squirts of pancake batter on a conveyor belt and c...