I just got back from Paradise. Yoho and Banff National Parks in the Canadian Rockies. We hiked the high trail through Wiwaxy Gap around Lake O'Hara, Paradise Valley to Giant Steps, up and down Fairview Mountain above Lake Louise, Takakkaw Falls to Laughing Falls along the Yoho River, and Sunshine to Egypt Lake via Healy Pass. It is some of the most beautiful hiking I have done. There is spot in the an alpine meadows around Healy Pass where I can easily spend the rest of my life.
She is too small to have backpacked this time, but luckily for Vivian, REI carries some tiny sizes of hiking stuff - boots and jackets and that sort of a thing. Once you are off the boob, girl.
My American NPS has been spoiling me. Parks Canada has a very loose notion of trails. If a mountain goat can scramble up, so could you. The nice warden with great legs who hiked Paradise Valley with us tried to explain to me the difference between trail and route, but I'm not buying it.
One more thing - for what the Canadians charge you, I expect fresh sheets of high thread count in my sleeping bag every night. But they do have a good thing going for them. When a girl from Parks Canada cornered Gunaraja at the trailhead to answer a survey, and she asked him what Parks Canada was doing well, I had to tell her that they made good scenery.
This is my first time away from Vivian. By the last day I am thumbing through her flickr photos on my phone. My flight into Austin gets in after 1am, but I quietly steal into her room and stare at my little girl for a long time. Paradise is where the heart is.
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