[You may view a map of Jasper National Park in PDF format and a map of Banff National Park in PDF format.]

Had my normal breakfast with Folgers instant coffee to go. It was cloudy and 31°F (-0.5°C). I got J's gum boots out from the "basement" of the RV so she could wear them this morning when we photograph near water because her hiking boots have tears along some seams that let in water if they get wet. We left at 7:50 in the Jeep.

We took Alberta-93A south then took the road to Moab Lake.

We stopped to photograph the Whirlpool River from near where I photographed it yesterday. This time I boulder-hopped out into river to get a different foreground (below left). The cloudy sky had some texture, but it was still a bit on the bland side. I used a polarizer to maximize the reflections off the water, a 2-stop graduated neutral density (ND) filter to hold back the sky, and seven stops of neutral density to blur the water. I didn't realize that the ISO was set at 400, a holdover from photographing the bighorn last night, until after we had left. :(

We left and headed back north on Alberta-93A and ...


Stopped at the Astoria River bridge just north of the road to Mt. Edith Cavell. I photographed a bit from the bridge and J went straight down to water level. I joined her and had to wait for her to finish photographing a composition that would have included me for the image I had in mind (above right). I used a polarizer to maximize the reflections off the water and seven stops of neutral density to blur the water.

We returned to the RV at 11:40 and prepped it to move. Right before pulling out of the site, I started to dump fresh water from the RV fresh water tank to reduce the amount of chlorine-laden water. The water in the tank was no longer bothering J, but I wanted to get as much out as we could. We left at 11:55 with me in the RV and J following in the Jeep.

We went to the four-hole dump station in the campground, and I shut off the water drain before dumping the gray (sink and shower waste) and black (toilet waste) tanks. Then we went across the street to the two-station fresh water faucets and started to take on water. Within about ten minutes, the tank was full and water was spewing out the inflow! It usually takes 15-20 minutes to load up our fresh water tank under good conditions (high water pressure), and I'm usually standing by ready to turn off the water and take out the hose as soon as the tank is full. This time, I was caught off guard inside the RV and J pointed out the odd sound with the water tank, and I had to run outside to shut off the water. Then I hooked up the Jeep to tow, something I had planned to do while taking on water. Then I had my normal lunch while going online one last time. I ordered some Caig Laboratories DeoxIT contact cleaner and some DeoxIT Shield contact protector for severe environments to use on our towed brake system brakeaway switch and umbilical cable. I hope that when these two parts are cleaned and have good electrical contacts, the US Gear Universal Brake System in the Jeep won't cycle intermittently when the RV is off and also that the Jeep battery won't be drained when we tow for long periods of time. (The umbilical cord provides power to the Jeep from the RV in addition to brake system information and tail light control.) We left around 1:00.

We first went to the Jasper townsite to drop off a card in the mail and to buy some milk from the Super A Foods grocery store. We left around 1:30 and headed down Alberta-93 on our way to the southern part of Jasper National Park.

We went by some areas with nice patches of fall color on the mountainsides, but the flat light would have made for uninteresting images. The brush in the valley by the Icefield Center was brown — no more fall color.

We reached Wilcox Creek Campground at 2:53. We occupied Site 2, the same one we had on our way north back in July. J registered while I set up camp. It was 38°F (3°C) with broken clouds. J went on a cleaning binge in the bathroom. First was the ceiling fan that had accumulated lint on the screen and the fan blades, then it was the bathroom itself. It looked fantastic when she was done! I downloaded images and edited them while J was cleaning. I left in the Jeep around 4:15 by myself and headed south into northern Banff National Park.

I stopped at Nigel Creek at 4:25. There's a footbridge across Nigel Creek near some fantastic potholes, and the conditions were much better now with a lower water level than they were in July. I had a blast photographing the creek and rock formations. In the image below left, the rock formation that's sticking out in the stream has a pothole that goes from the top of the rock all the way through the rock to where it's exposed to the water below. I used a polarizer to minimize the reflections off the wet rocks and seven stops of neutral density to increase the exposure time to completely blur the water. The piece of driftwood in the image below right really grabbed my attention! I used a polarizer to maximize the reflections off the water and seven stops of neutral density to increase the exposure time to completely blur the water. I left at 6:35, way later than I had planned — how time flies when you're having fun!


I returned to the RV at 6:42 to pick up J, We left at 6:47 and went ...

To Tangle Falls at 6:57, pretty close to the approximately 7:25 sunset. I had been looking forward to photographing here with my added neutral density arsenal, but was disappointed that the falls had changed enough with the lower water level that the image I really wanted to capture with more neutral density wouldn't work now. I was rushed because of the short time before sunset, and didn't find any interesting compositions until the sun had set over the nearby mountain ridge. Initially, the lower light helped to make long exposures, but pretty soon it was took dark to focus effectively. :( I even resorted to using the zoom feature on the rear LCD to check focus at the end! We left at 7:52.

We returned to the RV around 8:05. I downloaded images and edited them while J prepared dinner.

Had dinner of leftover pecan-crusted pork chops, loaded baked mashed potatoes, and peas. The pork chops tasted much better tonight than when we first had them two days ago. My pork chop was rather bland before but tonight it had a nice kick to it. :)

J showered immediately after dinner while I cleaned up the kitchen. Then I showered and did the dishes. I edited images from previous days to make more room on my internal hard drive.