Days 2-6 of our trip was spent with West Trek Tours, making our way up through the Rocky Mountains.  This post will cover days 2 and 3, which were spent traveling to different lakes, staying in cabins, and meeting Chester. None of us had ever been to any of these places and everything we saw was absolutely breathtaking. From the lakes, to the mountains, to the polar plunge with did in 4* water. That was the most breath-taking of them all. 😉

Pros of trip: Beautiful scenery, met awesome people (hola Mexicanos 🙂 ), polar plunge, hiking

Cons of trip: BUS TIME. Ugh I hate sitting still, but I hate sitting on a bus more. Russ and I got our naps habits down to a science, though.

I’ll let the pictures do the rest of the talking here.

If you are planning a trip to Canada and The Rockies, I definitely recommend West Trek tours! It was reasonably priced, our tour guide (Mia) and bus driver (Ian) were awesome and knowledgeable, we got to see A LOT in just a few short days, and it was-overall- a lot of fun. We opted out of the “extra” things that they offered (a gondola ride and a snow bus ride onto the glaciers) and were happy we did. They didn’t sound like they were worth the $$ and we still got to explore the glacier on our own and during the gondola ride…well, we enjoyed wifi at Starbucks, but had the option to go to a hot spring, which we did not do. We loved Banff and wished we had had more time to explore it, as well as the 3 lakes that we visited. We liked seeing the buffalo, but not the wolves. And we all agreed that staying in the cabins wasn’t worth the extra $$. Really nothing special since there wasn’t much of a view and there were soooo many mosquitos. My poor legs. If you have any specific questions about West Trek or our experience, reach out to me!!

Day 2 Pictures:

Kewlowna

I call this one “The Water Isn’t Cold”, a portrait.

And this one is called, “The Water Isn’t Cold, Part II” 

Cabin Wildlife, Golden, British Columbia

As you may be able to see from the above pictures, the cabins didn’t have much of a view, but they did have a sign that said “viewpoint” with an arrow that I, admittedly, did not check out.  While we waited for dinner (burgers, salad and smores), I opted to lie on the hammock in the trees and let the mosquitoes chow down on my legs 😉

Day 3 Pictures:

Breakfast at the cabins:

Off to see Chester, Chester Jr., Chester Sr. and the rest of the Chester Clan, at the Buffalo RanchHere they come!!!

Selfie with the Chesters

And then the bus got stuck in a ditch:

Wolf Center:

 Emerald Lake:    

Lake Louise

Banff:

This picture hardly does Banff justice, but it is an adorable little ski town with tons of shops, restaurants and bars to check out.  For dinner, we went to a restaurant that offers all different types of burgers (beef, chicken, turkey, elk, bison, salmon, etc) for the same price.  We each got a different burger and they were all SO GOOD.  And then we went back to the hotel for drinks and then back out to a nightclub in Banff.  I would have loved to had one full day, or at least a few more hours to spend walking around, but it is what it is.

That’s it for days 2 and 3.  I’ll be back with more pictures of Moraine Lake, polar plunging, hiking to a glacier, y mas.