Usual morning routine, which I think I’ve now found the most efficient order of doing things. Not that it ever really gets below 2 hours from waking up to getting on the road. 

 

Chilly start but I quickly rolled up to the only services I had marked on the map. I had this down as a gas station but it had a proper restaurant so I went in for another breakfast. Turned out to be pretty naff food, so kind of wish I hadn’t bothered. 

 

It was thankfully drier than yesterday but there still seemed to be a strange mist hanging over the mountain tops, despite the sun poking through. After a while I suspected it was smoke and not fog. Which a National Park staff member later confirmed. There are fires in Saskatchewan and Manitoba and the wind had changed direction overnight which was now blowing the smoke to the west. Comforting to know the fires were not local (although that would have seemed surprising given all the rain) but not the nicest to ride through. 

 

Stopped off at Athabasca Glacier which was cool to see, even if it is heavily retreated. It’s accompanied by an enormous tourist attraction which not only busses people to the edge of the ice but then allows them to get on another special bus to drive on top of the ice. The whole thing was pretty jarring and at odds with the National Park’s apparent focus on conservation. The combination of bus tours on glaciers and huge queues for the Starbucks had me feeling like I wanted to get out of there pretty quickly. Which is a shame. I don’t want to judge people being bussed from tourist spot to tourist spot but it is just a totally different way of experiencing the outdoors and a contrast to the mentality of most of the other people I’ve met over the last couple months. 

 

Carried on but was a little disinterested after the glacier experience and the smoke obscuring what should have been spectacular views. Might also be the effect of riding on the highway again which requires much lower levels of concentration to riding on dirt roads or trails - and provides more opportunity to get into my own head too much. 

 

I got to the first potential camp but it was very close to the highway and as it was only around 3pm I decided to push on to the next. Good decision in the end as it was a much nicer location on a lake. Shout out to Jasper National Park who offer biker camp spots for just CAD$4. Rain was forecast but held out throughout the evening which was a nice relief. I’d just retired to my tent and was writing this when I heard a ‘hello?’ outside. Opened the door to find the guy from the camper nearby who was offering me their leftover pork chops and potatoes. I may just be very sick of rice packets but the pork was one of the nicest things I’d eaten for a while. I guess there are some benefits of staying in more established places with other people around!