Contents
Overview of the details
What goes up, must come down! After conquering Wilcox Pass yesterday, it felt like we were on the home stretch. We still had some climbing ahead of us, but overall the route is downhill into Jasper from here on.
- Start/End: Day 4 — Wilcox Creek (campground) to Honeymoon Lake (campground)
- Route type: one way (northbound)
- Campground: Honeymoon Lake Campground, Jasper National Park (first come, first served)
- Distance: 57 km (including short detour to Sunwapta Falls)
- Elevation: Climbing— 115 m; Descending— 773 m
- First trip: September 2020
- Terrain: Paved highway, decent paved shoulder (usually)
- Notes specific to kids: Suitable for competent riders. This can be a high traffic route (depending on the season) due to tourism. It is hilly (especially for kids) although highway grades. Note that the section of climbing nearby the Brewster SkyWalk lookout is poor, the shoulder is really narrow here. The road is twisty with a variable shoulder going down past Tangle Falls, but at least you’re descending so have a bit more speed. All viewable on GoogleMaps StreetView.
- Highlights: Columbia Icefield (hot chocolate stop!); chasing rainbows; Sunwapta Falls; lots of descending; valley after icefield is beautiful, along the braided Sunwapta River.
Day 4: Journal Entry
It was cloudy and a bit chilly when we first got up, unfortunately, it looked as if it could rain. But no matter the weather, we needed to go. We said goodbye to the students when they were leaving for the glaciers, just before we were about to leave. When we got to the little trailhead kiosk close to the highway, just before we were going to leave, it started to rain.
Dad had already been a bit stressed out because of the weather before we left, but now it was a (way) bigger problem. We put on rain jackets, rain pants, bright yellow dish gloves, and even booties! We weren’t that far from the Icefields Centre, where you could go on tours to the icefields in a bus. But we weren’t there for a tour. We were there for hot chocolate; we biked there in the rain, and when we got there, that is exactly what we did. To do that, we had to go on the bridge that led you to the building, lock up our bikes, put on masks, go inside and ask for directions, go there, and buy the very hot hot chocolate, then go to a sheltered part of the porch, and (finally) drink it. Dad forgot to use the cash that we had found in the wrecked car!!! Thankfully he was carrying it, not me. There was a display about ammonite, and how it’s gaining popularity as an ornament for jewelry. Just outside the doors, when I was reading the sign at the ammonite display, Dad met some nice older folks who were also cycling the parkway.
When we started biking again, it was still raining. We were chasing a rainbow! This was good, because it meant that the rain was stopping and well, we were chasing a beautiful rainbow, and that’s just kind of neat. We stopped at a trailhead sign with information about a nice hike; we decided to eat lunch there and take off a layer of rain gear. It said on my map that there was a stop called Tangle Falls; so that was our next stop. Dad complained about me stopping for snacks six times on the way and that I was as slow as the glaciers when I was getting the snacks out and eating them particularly since we’d just had lunch. When we got there, we went to the parking lot, then we realized that there was a crosswalk going to the side of the highway that Tangle Falls was on. It was really annoying; we had already done the crossing-the-highway-safely-protocol, and then we had to do it again! Nevertheless, Tangle Falls was quite beautiful.
We passed by Poboktan Creek, which is another place where Parks staff houses are. We kept biking along, and we saw the giant’s salt! Remember how I talked about that earlier in our trip? That’s the one that i’m talking about! While we were passing the big pink boulders that resemble giant’s salt, I got the idea about the giant and his salt; I explained all the stuff about the giant and his salt to my Dad.
We were getting pretty close to Honeymoon Lake; I was excited. We got to the campground, and it seemed like a pretty nice one. Dad asked me to get some water, we had seen the water tap on the way in; it was right next to the lake. The lake was absolutely beautiful. Dad kept wanting to go skinny-dipping with me. I didn’t want to. Dad told me that I needed to; I suppose that’s true, but that looked like one darn cold lake, even though it wasn’t a lake made out of melted glacier, like Waterfowl Lakes, or the rivers that we passed by. I guess you do get pretty sweaty riding the Icefields Parkway. I eventually went in.
We played games again, this time starting with a bit of Snakes and Ladders at the picnic table. Upon finishing the game of Snakes and Ladders, we decided to have a game of chess, like we’ve been doing during the trip, but this time, we started at the picnic table. We continued the game of chess in our sleeping bags, and Dad won again! Our series was tied so far, I had won the first two rounds, and Dad had won the past two rounds; tomorrow would be the world championship chess game. Tomorrow was also the day that we would see Mom and my little sister.
Other days in this trip
Other family-friendly bike trips in the region
