three lakes

Today was a day of three lakes.

Denise surprised me with her choice for our longer hike. She usually doesn't choose a long hike in the woods; she likes to be above the trees so she can see things. Our first hike was from Lake Louise to Lake Agnes. Small lakes in the mountains create a pull for Denise; I guess that's why she decided it would be OK to walk up and up and up through the woods (starting at 5741 feet and reaching a high of 7005 feet.

It was worth the walk up to see Lake Agnes; it was a gem of a lake. I really liked the patterns in the land above the lake coupled with the reflections in the water.

There was a bit of a loop in the trail. When we got to a point just before the surface of Lake Agnes there were a lot of human-made wooden steps to climb. Oh! I wonder how the builders got all of the finished wood and support structures - and all of the wood for the Lake Agnes tea house - up there. There were horses walking part of the trails; maybe they helped.

Back to the stairs... when we started down we saw a second set of stairs so we decided to try them. When we finished the stairs and started walking on the trail again Denise almost immediately turned around and climbed back up the stairs. The trail on that side felt a lot steeper than the side we came up, so she figured we would go back down the same way we came up. She stopped on the steps to chat with some other people. While she was talking two people who we met walking up walked down the stairs and started down the path. In just a few minutes they were climbing back up the stairs too. They said they thought this side was too steep. That made Denise feel much better - it wasn't just her thinking that the trail was uncomfortably steep!

After our down and down and down walk we stayed at Lake Louise for a little bit, enjoying the turquoise waters. Next we headed for Moraine Lake. Why do you think some of the names start with the word "Lake" and some end with the word "Lake"? Sometimes I think that people are just a little bit odd!

When we arrived at Moraine Lake it felt like there were hordes of people there. And uh oh! Denise really doesn't like large groups of people. I told her it would be better once we moved away from the end of the lake. It's a good thing that I was right about that; otherwise we would have jumped right back in the car. I'm glad the walk down the lake was a good one. We took a side jaunt up a trail to see the sign about bears - a good number of the trails in the area required that you walk in groups of 4 or more. I guess that's a good number of people to make enough noise to not surprise the bears.

Moraine Lake was wearing a different shade of turquoise than Lake Louise. The water shimmered in the sunlight, seeming to change colors (or shades of color).

--- Rover

reflecting patterns, Lake Agnes