Ok, my Banff pictures are up. Here's a small sample:

Seebe Across Moraine Lake Moraine Lake, wide
Lake Louise Victoria Glacier Valley Lake Louise Lodge
Sulphur Mountain Gondola Station Bighorn Ram Banff Lodge and Bow Falls

More coming later after I sort through the ones Diana took while I was (mostly) going to talks.




Comments:

michiexile:
2009-08-31T08:29:30Z
Oh, it's GORGEOUS in summer. My Banff photos are all white.
11011110:
2009-08-31T17:52:16Z
This was my first time there, so I can't really compare, but yes, it was very pretty. I regret a little bit not having time to continue further on the hike behind Lake Louise; I've heard that it's even more spectacular in there.
gareth_rees:
2009-08-31T21:03:53Z
Yes, there's the plain of the six glaciers (somewhat depleted by global warming) and Mounts Aberdeen, Lefroy, and Victoria.
11011110:
2009-08-31T21:23:30Z
You took that at a colder time of year, I take it. Though there were still a few patches of snow visible high on the slopes of some of the mountains when we were there, not even counting the glaciers.
gareth_rees:
2009-08-31T21:40:00Z
Yes, that was in mid-June. But the weather is really changeable and it can snow (or be sunny) at any time in the summer. Here's Ha Ling Peak (near Canmore) covered in snow and a pleasant walk just three days later. (And showing clearly the spectacular tilting of strata caused by the Rundle thrust fault.)
11011110:
2009-08-31T21:53:56Z

That's a very dramatic change.

The strata were certainly evident when we were there. I saw on one of the signs an explanation that one can tell where in the Rockies one is by the tilt: in the central rockies, the layers are flat, but in the front ranges they can be very tilted, and farther on the extremes they are not so much tilted as crumpled.

It was also a bit of a surprise to me how easy it was to get around in the Banff area, as long as one sticks to the wide flat glacial valleys. I'm more used to the California coast ranges, in which the mountains and the roads through them can be extremely twisty. (An example in the north of California, that we drove a few weeks ago.) The Rockies have difficult terrain higher up, of course, but the difference is that the coast ranges don't have so much of the flat valley floors to use instead.