Day 10 Golden to Lake Louise (80km)

Trip Stats:

https://www.polarpersonaltrainer.com/shared/exercise.ftl?shareTag=a73950fe8d4cda80494fad7da558d2ac

Today is our last day in British Columbia and the climbs give us a break (at least that is what the locals are saying). I woke up today very sleepy, because we lost an hour due to changing into mountain-time yesterday. I maybe had five hours of sleep and it took me a little time to wake up, but I knew all I had to do was get to Lake Louise, and I would have a rest day.

 It is amazing to see The Great Divide as it seems to exist as a wallpaper of mountains in the sky. Pretty neat to think that this is the boundary that separates the Pacific and Atlantic watersheds. I saw the sign welcoming people into British Columbia but didn’t see the sign welcoming us into Alberta, so that is why we haven’t included that!

 Anyways, today’s ride was all good until I got past Yoho National Park and The Village of Field. I noticed a female cyclist was walking her bike down the steep hill ahead, so I crossed the road to see if I could lend a hand. I figured she may need a tube or a quick fix, but I was alarmed to see she had fallen and injured her leg badly. Iah was from Japan and visiting Lake Louise/surrounding area, but she rented a terrible bike from some awful company (wish I knew which one). She hit a bump and took a mean spill that left her clothes torn and a hole the size of a silver dollar just right of her kneecap. This was disgusting! I could see her ligaments and bone but it wasn’t bleeding. I knew Iah needed medical attention but Yoho’s visitor center was over 5 clicks away and Elyse was at least 9 clicks the other way, up the mountain. I told her to keep walking towards Yoho and try to flag down a car, while I cycled to get Elyse. You don’t get cellphone service in areas like this and a satellite radio should maybe be something one carries as a necessity item; however, I knew Elyse was up the mountain and I had to try to get to her quickly. I made it up the mountain and we raced back to Iah, so we could throw her in our van and drive her to the medical center in Lake Louise. Lake Louise was about 20km’s from where I stopped riding and we got Iah to the medical center for attention.

We checked into The Lake Louise Inn, where we will be staying tonight and tomorrow night. We can’t thank the folks at The Lake Louise Inn enough for putting us up in a beautiful room!!! Here is a link to their website and I totally recommend staying here if you visit Lake Louise!

http://www.lakelouiseinn.com/ 

Don’t blink…We are only in Alberta for six days. I hope they are a great six days.