July 13

I was going to leave Calgary today, but it rained quite a bit in the morning, so Helen suggested I again leave my gear at her house, zip off for a day trip, and return.  She had a golf tournament, and suggested I drop by for the tournament dinner on my way back.  Fortunately for the golfers, the sun came out and things dried out.  It was still a bit chilly, so I suited up as I hadn't done since early in the trip.  Long underwear, jeans and work shirt, and full leathers, with insulated gloves.  I looked like I was auditioning for "Lads in Leather - Pudgy Edition."

Drove off to the parks for the second time.  It is about 1 1/2 hours from Calgary, if I failed to mention it before.  Overcast and at times down to 50 degrees.  I finally not only wore my scarf around my neck and spread out over my chest, I flattened out my ski hat and wore it under the leather jacket just below the scarf.  Helped a lot, but still cold.

I drove through Banff National Park again until the turn north to go through Jasper National Park.  Took no pictures with my real camera because the light was so flat.  Here are two I took with my phone.

See what I mean by flat light?

For this one, the sun came out just a bit.

Given the weather - always threatening rain - and the temps, I did not go all the way to the town of Jasper at the north end of the park.  Did travel through a good deal of it though.  The road runs through a fairly narrow valley with mountain after mountain on both sides of the road, on and on and on.

At one point, there was a lodge by a lake.  I stopped to get something hot to drink.  Getting back out, I had to negotiate a small space because a car parked next to me.  I dropped the bike doing 0 mph.  Bad words escaped my lips.  In my defense, I will say I thought many more bad words than I actually uttered, but still.  A fine gentleman walking by helped me get it right back up, but rats!  I'd gone through the whole trip without this happening.

After 50 or so miles up the valley, I turned around and headed back to Calgary.  I was so cold - the guys on bicycles were wearing face masks - and tired that I did not stop at Helen's country club for dinner.  Good thing, too, because as it turned out, I was early and she was late.  I did text her to say I wasn't coming, but I sent the text to her home phone, not her cell.  Way to go, Luddite.

Tomorrow I really leave Calgary and will go through a third park, Kootenay.

PS. Saw a bear today.