Sunday September 18 – Hiking around Fairmont Hot Springs & Radium Hot Springs

Another glorious day.  We decided to head to the golf course for their $5c breakfast. (Reminder: you get what you pay for!). We had a little excitement when the caravan of gold carts were lining up as if in a parade. Dottie had overhead two staff members in the parking lot talking on two-way radios about bear on # 7 hole.  The golf carts all took off headed there. Two hours later we had finished our eggs and coffee and were on the road again.  We never did see the bear and her 2 cubs. We decided it was a hiking day.  The first hike was in the Hoodoo's; a pretty hike that took us up to see the whole Columbia Lake region and the sand stone Hoodoos. 

We returned to our cabins and had delicious sandwiches on the Frament's deck.  The bread was a cheese Kaiser roll and it was yummy!!  After we were all stuffed, we decided we needed another hike and headed back into Radium Hot Springs inside the National Park.  We found the trail head on the second try and struck off.  We started down, down, down toward a creek.  There was a gushing waterfall and stream.

 

We ultimately crossed the stream and began to hike up, up, up.  After a while we thought, "are we ever going to get there?"  Suddenly an angel appeared, in the guise of a woman named Donna.  She was a local and helpfully told us where we were on the trail and encouraged us to continue to the top and then to walk down to the springs. She continued onwards and we lost sight of her.

After walking a ways, we wondered aloud...”where is that bench she told us about?”  Through the trees, out of sight, comes her voice.  You're almost there!  So we continued on and met up with her to share the view.  We talked for a while and we silently agreed to share the rest of the trail walk together.   We told her she was our angel sent to show us the right way.  She said she understood completely -- she's had a number of angels in her life. She had one special angel in particular.

 

She shared a synchronicity story about her youth.  She lived in Ottawa at the time and was a young adult with an old jalopy. The car was notoriously unreliable, but was all she had.  It broke down a lot and she got stranded.  On at least four separate occasions she was rescued by the same man!!  On the last occasion there was a bad snow storm on the day she was set to leave town.  She slid off the road into a forest and hit a tree.  As she got out of her car, the same man was tromping through the forest to her rescue!  Her special angel never failed to show up whenever she was stranded, whether he was alone or had his carful of his kids with him. Angels are everywhere!! 

When we got to the end of the trail by the Radium hot springs, the girls waited at the hot springs while the guys fetched the car, walking the rest of the way down the highway with Donna. Another synchronicity: The guys said that when they got down to the parking lot, Donna's car was next to ours. These were the only 2 cars in the parking lot.

  

The fellows returned with our swimsuits and towels in hand to meet up with the girls. The soak at Radium was SO refreshing!!!!!  The hot springs that are within the Banff Nat'l park cost $6.50 C for each adult, but at the private baths in Fairmont, it was $14 pp. we got such a deal at Miette and Radium.   We soaked for a long while and chatted with even more interesting people-- local Canadians with great senses of humor when talking about our upcoming election.

Then it was time to head back to Fairmont Hot Springs to our bungalow to change and head to the town's fanciest restaurant, Tony the Greek's,  for dinner.  The food was so fresh and perfectly seasoned-- even the pita was outstanding. Yummy!!! Definitely the best deal in town, and possibly in all of British Columbia.

Everyone was fully sated from exercise, food and the soak.  All slept like rocks!