Sunday – July 8, 20007 Banff

Our photo of the day is a little different than the usual “scenic” but still part of the local “color”. For the past few days, Dan the One Man Band (his moniker) has been playing in a small park in the middle of Banff – right on main street. (I call it a park – it has shrubs and seats plus a round depressed area in the center that is probably flooded in winter for ice skating.) Dan would play almost any request. While we were listening, he was doing Johnny Cash – not too badly. Someone in the crowd asked for a Spice Girls number and he admitted he didn’t know any. Besides the guitar, he played the harmonica (when he wasn’t singing). The right foot played the bass drum and the left, the cymbal and tambourine.

Tonight (Sunday) is our last night in Banff. It will make nine nights we have been here. I won’t say we’ve seen everything because I can think of several “adventures” that we never got around to. And of course there is the winter season which has to be totally unlike anything we’ve experienced. Maybe someday? If you ever get the opportunity to spend some time here, do, for you’ll enjoy it. It is incredibly beautiful, even the air smells sweet and spicy. Folks are friendly, the mountains magnificent, and the vistas never cease to be breathe taking. Plus, you’ll feel right at home.

It was cloudy today with patches of sunlight with temperatures in the low 70’s. Very pleasant, all in all.
The clouds seemed more like mist in the early morning, but more cloud-like with patches of blue sky and warm sun as the day progressed. By evening (twilight at 9:00) the sunlight was moving over the mountains illuminating this part, leaving that in shade, then changing again. Fascinating.

We did not plan any “strenuous” activity today, actually planned to read and do some clean-up in preparation for our departure tomorrow. We knew we needed a few things from the grocery store so Margaret made up one of her famous “lists” of things and we headed out in the late morning. This time, we decided to visit the small town just southeast of us – Canmore, Alberta. We had driven through it coming to Banff and remembered the Safeway sign. We had not thought to explore it sooner. Too bad.

We really enjoyed Canmore. It was primarily a mining town in its early days. There may still be mining going on, but we didn’t see any evidence. However, it appeared to us to be the “bedroom” community for service workers in Banff. Canmore is roughly 10 miles southeast on Trans-Canada Hwy 1 – 4 lane divided highway – basically an interstate highway design. The main street had some original buildings but mostly there were beautiful shops, galleries, and restaurants. And there were a couple center complexes, Safeway. The houses were beautiful.

Canmore is outside the Banff National Park and thus is not limited in its growth, i.e., the kinds of businesses that can open there, who can live there, and lots of other factors that I can only guess at. One thing we found interesting in Banff (that probably wouldn’t be true in Canmore) is that you cannot live in Banff unless you are employed in Banff. Banff is within the national park and subject to the park rules and regulations. Our tour guide at the Cave and Basin Historic site told us this fact and admitted some folks try to get around it by operating B&B’s, etc. But officially, even if Michael Jordan (or Bill Gates) wanted to live in Banff, he’d have to get a job at McDonald’s flipping burgers! It makes the town accessible to everyone.

In Canmore we found restaurant and grocery store prices noticeably cheaper than in Banff. But the few real estate listings we saw in RE offices were anything but cheap. Most of the houses and apartments listed for Canmore started in the high 300,000’s and went up from there. Even though this is in Canadian dollars (roughly 1.04 Canadian dollars to 1.00 US Dollars) it is still pretty expensive. We think that if you owned one of these, you could live in it for a couple of summer months and then rent it out for the rest of the year to the snow birds. Lots of skiing possibilities and it’s only about 50 miles from Calgary.

We had a great time in Canmore. Wish we’d found it a few days earlier. Margaret discovered a store that featured Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Bhutan and other Asian antiques (Chinese wedding bed, chests, benches, pillars, boxes, rugs, fabrics, carved pieces – just lovely). The sales lady said that almost everything in the store was between 100 – 300 years old. She was native Canadian and was surprised that we were from Florida. One of the few sales persons we’ve run into that seemed genuinely interested in who we were and where we’d lived / been. (I know she wasn’t trying to make a sale! Her merchandise won’t fit in the motor-home!)

Once again, we found ourselves in a town at lunch time (actually closer to 1:30 p.m.). Lots of choices, so we ended up in a Japanese / Thai / flavored restaurant. I had Japanese ramen and Margaret had Singapore Curry chicken rice (usually noodles). Great food, lovely place settings and friendly atmosphere. The chef, elderly Oriental gentleman, brought us a sample dish that he was considering putting on the menu, and asked for our opinion. I’ll let Margaret describe it, but let me say it was delicious. M. It was twice-braised pork in a clear sweet broth with a sprinkling of Japanese spices. It was absolutely wonderful.

After a stop at the Safeway, we returned “home” and got to some last minute chores. I washed the front, back, and lower sides, and windows of the motor-home to get rid of some of the grime we picked up in Saskatchewan. All Saskatchewan autos seemed to be perpetually dirty (lots of dirt roads) and no one seems to bother washing them – pride of ownership? Whereas the Alberta cars (in and around Calgary at least) seem to be kept pretty clean.

Margaret is out walking Suki – his last stroll in Banff. Not sure what we’ll find down the road, so she’s making sure he gets his exercise.

M. Wayne didn’t tell you about the wine store in Canmore. It was their second day of business. The shop featured fine wines from all the expected places around the world and from Canada as well. Wayne was interested in the local wines, as the Okanagan Valley is where we are headed next. We had tasted one last year that was excellent, but we didn’t know much about the region other than what the waiter told us. The two owners were delighted to give their recommendations on where to visit and what wines were especially well suited to their Canadian environment, resulting in especially good wines. We had a friendly chat. Wayne bought two bottles, one Pinot Gris and one Syrah from the Okanagan Valley, which is Canada’s Napa.

This has been a wonderful part of our journey.