Alberta Trip - Day 9 - Lake Louise, Fairview Mountain Hike

Gabe at Fairview Mountain, Lake Louise.

On our second last day in Alberta we did our toughest climb. This was up Fairview Mountain from the Lake Louise parking lot. We started relatively late so, of course, the parking lot was full. We had to park way down the road on the shoulder with all the other late comers.

The Fairview Mountain hike is over 10 kilometres long (return) with an elevation gain of 1013 metres. That's almost twice as tall as the C.N. Tower (at 553 metres).

Like the Sulphur Skyline hike in Jasper it starts in the trees. An hour to an hour and a half in the trail starts to open up as you pass the tree line. Shortly after, at 3.7 kilometres, you hit Saddleback Pass. That's where we took our first break.

After Saddleback Pass the trail goes seemingly straight up for the next 1.4 kilometres. It's very difficult with loose rock and steep slopes. Sometimes you even lose sight of the trail. We passed a group of four girls who threw in the towel part way up and headed back. Yeah, it's that hard.

We reached the summit around an hour later. The view from the top is incredible. You can see the surrounding mountain peaks including the ones that lead down to Lake Louise below.

As with our Sulphur Skyline hike we saw a rogue chipmunk up top looking for snacks. The little critters are everywhere.

Though I don't quite remember now, I'm assuming we snacked up top because we spent over an hour there. I'm sure we weren't taking pictures the whole time.

The trip down took a little under 2 hours. At around 6:00 p.m. the sun was getting low in the sky. Still we hung around Lake Louise a little longer taking pictures of the lake and famous hotel. Little known fact - Lake Louise is named after Queen Victoria's fourth daughter, Princess Louise Caroline Alberta. As well, and quite obviously, the province of Alberta is named after her.

For dinner we headed down to Banff, some 40 minutes southeast on Highway 1. We decided to eat at Saltlik a steakhouse on Bear Street not far from Wild Flour where we had breakfast a few days earlier.

At Saltlik we all opted for beef, delicious Alberta beef. I had the Certified Angus Beef 10 oz. prime sirloin while some of the others chose the 10 oz. Blue Cheese California cut striploin. There are no bad choices here.

None of the dishes come with sides. You have to order them separately. We chose the scalloped potatoes, mac and cheese and mixed veggies to share. All in all a great way to end the day.