West Coast Adventure (Part 8) – Whistler and Jasper

Our next few days of adventures were big. We saw high peaks and long valleys, crazy chairlifts and even longer zip lines. Yes, we had been looking forward to visiting Whistler and wanted to take in as much as we could in the short time we were there.

Before getting to the town of Whistler and checking in to our hotel, we stopped at the Sea to Sky gondola in Squamish that overlooks a Shannon Falls. We opted to not do the gondola – which had it’s cables cut by vandals just days later! – as we would be going up the ones in Whistler but the falls were beautiful and if we had more time we would have hiked some of the trails in this area. Next time….

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Whistler Bound

Once arriving in Whistler, we organized our plans for the next two days trying to optimize our time. We booked the Peak to Peak experience along with a zip line tour for the following morning. This way we would get a ride up and down the gondola, across the valley from Whistler to Blackcomb and then another ride up for the zip line tour.

It is amazing just how many people were at this resort in the summer! Albeit it was filled with lots of people mountain biking (of which Dan was very jealous to not be riding), as well as lot of tourists going to the top of the mountains sight seeing.

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It takes a gondola and a chair lift to get to the very top of Whistler, where we headed for the Cloudraker Skybridge that provided some crazy views down into the mountains and valleys below.

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We wandered around the peak taking in the panoramic views that surrounded us. It was so clear that we could see so very far away.

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There were many places for picture opportunities and just about every tourist was willing to help out someone else in taking these photos. Both the photos below were taken with the help of others and we reciprocated the offer as well.

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Now, you wouldn’t think it could happen in such a short time, but I was starting to feel the effects of the altitude. My head was getting fuzzy and I knew it was time that we started to head back down the lift and across the gondola to Blackcomb. Even as we waited in line, I overhead a few other people talking about not feeling the best as well. Just be warned that this can happen when you visit such high altitudes.

Once we got a little lower I started to feel better and we waited in line for the Peak to Peak gondola. This gondola crossed from the peak in Whistler, to the peak in Blackcomb, travelling a total of 4.4 km, a Guinness World record distance!

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Blackcomb was a less busy, which was just fine with us. As we explored the chalet there was an ice cream stand outside which had non dairy options! I’m totally a sucker for ice cream that I can eat, even if it’s super expensive LOL. Hayden and I both enjoyed a very small scoop before we headed back down the mountain to search for some actual supper food.

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As we wandered around the village of Whistler looking for a place to eat, we came across El Furniture Warehouse. All meals were $5. Now being the skeptics that we are, we had to actually go check out the menu. Sure enough, every item on the menu was $5. Can’t go wrong with that price, so we waited to be seated and looked through the menu. Hayden went for the chicken fingers and fries and both Dan and I had a chicken burger. The bowl of Hayden’s food was MASSIVE! Good thing too as he was very hungry.

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The rest of our evening was spend walking the village and then going for a little swim in the hotel pool to relax. We had big plans for the next morning and really needed a good rest to prepare us for some CRAZY!!!

SASQUATCH ZIPLINE

When planning this visit, my cousin was mentioning that Whistler has THE BIGGEST and LONGEST zipline in North America. We knew we just HAD to do it. There were other options available which provided multiple zip lines, but we went for the big one. While waiting for our turn the boys kept themselves busy on the Nintendo systems that were in the chalet.

It was finally our turn to go and we headed up the gondola once again. These gondola rides are also crazy. It takes 15 minutes to get to the first level and we kept going. Finally at our destination we hopped into a van to drive down the mountain to our launching point. It was now that Hayden was starting to feel a little worried.

Once strapped in, you are required to take 4 steps down, then wait to until given permission to launch yourself down the zipline. I’m pretty sure Hayden yelled the entire way! We have some GoPro video of this only as we did not take our phones in case they got dropped. It was quite the ride! On my ride I let go of my hands and just let gravity do its thing. Absolutely Amazing!

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The remainder of the day we spend driving East through the mountains along the northern road to Jasper. We stopped at a local campground called Canoe River Campground where we slept next to the rushing Canoe River.

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Good Morning Mist and Mountains

Waking up with mountains surrounding us is just amazing. It is hard to believe that we would no longer see these mountains by the end of our day. That morning we made an impromptu stop at Mt Robso which we could see from far away, but didn’t realize that there was a visitor center near the base. I opted to take a semi dangerous photo of the mountain flanked by the trees from the road, but was happy when we did come across the visitor center where I could get a better closeup picture.

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Along the road to Jasper we came across some wildlife. Please be careful when sightseeing and getting pictures of big animals. There were a few people a little too close to the elk that was foraging on the grass. We were able to give Hayden a little lesson on ethics of animal watching. He knew that those people were not being safe and could seriously get harmed.

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The remainder of our drive was not very eventful as we made our drive to Edmonton. This was another spontaneous stop to check out the West Edmonton Mall. Hayden had been asking about going to a water park on the whole trip, so we made the last minute decision to check out the one at the mall instead of driving to Calgary, but kept it a secret from him. Come back next week to read about our final instalment of this wonderful west coast adventure.