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Austin360 blogs > Out & About > Archives > 2008 > July > 27 > Entry

Mountain West No. 6: Canada

By Michael Barnes | Sunday, July 27, 2008, 05:32 PM

If it’s Saturday, it must be Canada. We hopped over the border to Alberta yesterday to sample the Canadian side of the International Peace Park, there known a Waterton Lakes.

The name, and that of its center, Waterton Township, should give you a clue about the comparative tidiness, geniality, quaintness and, well, Canadian-ness of this national park. Impressive lodges, manifold ice cream parlors, three-wheel bicycles and immaculately kept lawns, as well as the usual spectacular scenery we’ve come to know over at Glacier National Park.

The big excitement came as we left, when two yearling grizzlies, long-legged, black-bottomed and probably adolescent males, first nosed around brush, then dived into a nearby pond right next to the road, attracting quite a crowd. Edith also thinks she saw a wolf not long after that in the high grass pointed to the American border. Earlier in the day, it was more mountain goats and bighorn sheep, once exotic, now commonplace in our new found nature experience.

The border guards on each side of the international ine could have been — and may be — brothers cheerful, bright-eyed, despite having to ask the same two dozen questions of everyone. We laughed helplessly when the Canadian guard queried if we were carrying currency in excess of $10,000. Tired, I guess, of dodging Angus in the Blackfeet Reservation that one crosses to reach the high-mountain border.

The older American guard, coming back, poked fun at our short stay in Canada. “Yeah, they went over to purchase some dirt,” he deadpanned, looking at the mud caking our transport. The younger guard made a mild druggie joke when Rob said the only tobacco we carried was a pack of “smokes.” Homeland Security is not so tense high in the Rockies.