by Ben | May 16, 2017 | Places
Peaks of the Icefields Parkway “A new world was spread at our feet; to the westward stretched a vast icefield probably never before seen by the human eye, and surrounded by entirely unknown, unnamed, and unclimbed peaks.” J Norman Collie, 1898 It may be hard to...
by Ben | May 14, 2017 | People, Places
Sunwapta Falls Rocky Mountain Lodge By Matt Corlett, as told to Tammie Burak Sometime in the mid-1940’s, William (Bill) Hayhurst, a Jasper high school principal opened Sunwapta Tea House on lease land. He built some cabins. There was no power, no water. Bill was a bit...
by Ben | May 14, 2017 | People, Places
Arthur Coleman Discovers the Icefields Parkway Route, 1884 In 1884, Arthur Coleman, a geology professor at the University of Toronto, arrived in the Rockies on a quest to find a mysterious mountain he’d read about in an 1827 entry of the journal of David Douglas, a...
by Ben | May 14, 2017 | People, Places
The Palliser Expedition, 1857-60 John Palliser was born in Ireland in 1817 to a wealthy family. He loved hunting and exploring and caught the passion for frontier life when on a hunting expedition in Missouri in 1847-48. He later conceived a plan to lead an expedition...
by Ben | May 14, 2017 | People, Places
The fur trade was a driving force behind the development of Canada as a nation, but it started quite by accident. European fishermen drying cod in Newfoundland to sell in Europe, traded cloth with First Nations people who brought them furs in exchange. The fishermen...
by Ben | May 14, 2017 | People, Places
People of the Parkway – Part 1. First Nations Archaeological evidence shows that First Nations people have been present in the Icefields Parkway area for thousands of years. More than 20 distinct aboriginal groups have been identified. These include the present...