Hiking in Jasper on the September long weekend.

I planned to lead a club hiking trip to Jasper on the September long weekend.   But that fell through.  It's one thing to lead a day hike, but another thing to organize a weekend one.  I reserved a spot at the Whistler's group campsite way back in Spring, and paid the small $20 deposit.  It would be a great cheap way for the club to enjoy the park!

But alas, due the rainy weather forecasted, I didn't have enough people interested and I had to cancel the club trip almost at the last moment.

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But not to fear!  Fellow club member, Uta, who wanted to go on the trip, STILL wanted to go on the trip, even if it was not part of the club.  Even though I had just biked through there in August, I was excited to return.

We drove out on Saturday morning, stopping by some rivers, including one in Valemont, to see if any Salmon were spawing.  We spotted some in Valemont.

Afterwards. we continued on to Jasper. As it was still raining, we decided to keep dry at the Jasper Park Lodge.  It reminded me of hotel in the Shining, for some reason.  

We stayed at the Maligne Canyon Hostel, which was more in our budgets.  Next morning, we decided to do a hike up the Opal Hills.  I haven't really done much hiking in Jasper.  Opal Hills was not too hard for me, in only one hour of climbing, we reached the glorious Alpine!

Despite the cloudy day, we didn't see much rain and the views were still spectacular.  We could see part of the long winding Maligne Lake below.

We hiked off the trail until we reached this great viewpoint.

We could see the Bald Hills Mountain across the lake.  That's another hike that I'd like to do one day.

We hiked back down another loop.  This is a great hike and I recommend it if you like to do some hiking in Jasper National Park.

When we reached the bottom, we looked up where we just went up.

We then did some more hiking East of Jasper.

Here is the Maligne Canyon hostel we stayed at.  Nice affordable accomodation, though I was chilled.  I didn't know that I could have used my sleeping bag.  I will remember that next time.

Next time - Checking out Edith Cavell after the Angel Glacier incident a few years back.