September 4, 2007
To Jaspar National Park: Into Alberta and Whistler campground
We pack up a wet tent, yet again, and head for the restaurant near the visitor center. Yesterday the camp host put up a "Campground closed" sign at the Eastern part of the campground, people left, and no one came in anymore on our side, so there were no neighbors at all. We have to wait a few minutes for the restaurant to open at 8am, then we are the first ones to put our breakfast orders in today. Mt. Robson is hidden in clouds this morning, as we leave and climb our first hill of the day....and ....it starts to rain. (Addendum: in transposing the journal from paper to electronic, this gives a chance to review the tour... and though we knew at the time we were having lots of cycling in the rain, now it's pretty evident almost every day we had rain.)
We keep climbing to reach the summit of Yellowhead Pass, the lowest pass across the Rocky Mountains discovered by the fur-trapper with the blond hair. We have a stiff tailwind, and the climbing goes easy. At the pass is a rest area where we eat a lunch and spread out our tent to dry in the sun that has broken through. We try to coordinate eating with the sun breaking through so we can dry stuff. But then have to scramble packing back up as a rain cloud passes right over head. At the pass is also the border of the province Alberta, not much further beyond starts the Jasper National Park.
We had been warned by other cyclists, but still are surprised at the fees.
The charge is $8.90 per day per person or $17.80 per day for a family. A year pass is about $125, the cheaper way to go if you stay more than 7 days. Obviously, the intent is to get a lot of money from passing tourists, while giving a reasonably priced year pass to locals who can visit often. Nothing new.
We buy a one-day pass.
Another 20km to the junction, we turn South to go to Whistler Campground. Fees are pretty steep here too about $25 a site. We ride past the guard station without looking back and circle the campground. Patrick asks a young German couple if we can share their site and they agree. We pay them half the fee and pitch our tent.
After a warm shower we get back on our bikes and ride the 3km back to Jasper town. It is full of hotels/motels, shops and restaurants. We go to the park information center and see three other cyclists. One of them, Robbie, joins us later for a beer at the brew pub. Two pitchers later and a full belly from a burger and fish and chips we lead Robbie back to the campground and show him the fire exit we discovered to enter/leave the campground unseen.
He scouts around and finds a guy willing to share a site as well.
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Today's ride: 100 km (62 miles)
Total: 13,982 km (8,683 miles)
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