As it happens, today is Jasper's 100th anniversary. Jasper National Park was founded on September 14, 1907. It forms part of an extensive UNESCO World Heritage Site of 22,900 square kilometers, along with Banff, Kootenay and Yoho National Parks, and Mount Robson, Assiniboine and Hamber Provincial Parks in BC.
There is no finer place in the world to poo in the woods- they even provide these loos with a view:



they come complete with Lumpy, a pooey mascot who provides helpful instructions for changing toilet bowls:

I told ya you should've come with! What a great hike- perfect weather, amazing scenery, and the fish were even biting:



We met some fellow hikers who saw a grizz on the trail where we were headed but we never ran into him. It rained/snowed the second night but we stayed nice and dry in the tent. So really, it was el tiempo bueno the whole time.



I made a couple of quick video blogs, in which you get the distinct impression that I was making Robin do all the work. That's cause I have him all trained up from the coal mine.
Anyways, here's the Flickr Photo set of the whole trip.

Yay for Jasper!
We had a pretty nice weekend in Jasper. The photo above is from our ill-fated expedition to find the sandstone hoodoos and tunnel-like notch through a cliff towards Pocahontas. It was ill-fated because we trudged through kilometers of hard, crusty snow looking for said landmarks, only to turn back in defeat and see them, plain as day, right near the start of the trail. So many things depend on angle and perspective. Oh well. Next time.
Our main focus was just relaxing and getting away for a while, and we accomplished that masterfully. There's a mammoth tusk on display in one of the storefronts so that was really all I needed to make me happy. Oh yeah and the black wolf we saw on the drive out. The bears, of course, are having a rest.

We're back from our First Year Anniversary Moon! We went on a road trip, driving down the Rockies to Southern Alberta. We camped in Jasper where we stoically endured a crazy booming thunderstorm all night. Michelle was a little worried, but I kept thinking about how Karen Ellis would render such an adventure. Here is my attempt at a Planet Karen homage- which taxed my drawing skills pretty much to their limit. Plus I took some artistic licence, which probably means my licence should be revoked:




You see why I leave cartooning to people like Karen.
Anyway, we had a pretty nice time, we survived the deluge. And we saw a black bear with two cubs! So cute. But dangerous, always remember that, kids. Some more pics here if you're interested.
Now I have to go work nightshift. Pirates will have to wait till next week.

For Alex and Michelle’s wedding slideshow that I made, there were two pictures of Alex, taken some 20 years apart, in the same location. The first was of him as a baby resting cozily in the arms of Jasper the Bear, and the second shows him pretending to be choked by that same bear.
If you’ve ever been to Jasper, you know what I’m talking about. The Town of Jasper’s mascot is Jasper the Bear, and there are a couple fiberglass statues of him around town. Every tourist who has ever visited Jasper likely has a picture taken next to the bear. Since I grew up less than an hour’s drive from there, I am sadly lacking such a photo. It’s funny how we’ll take pictures of places we’ve spent exactly ten seconds of our lives at, preserving the moment forever, and then the places that actually have meaning in our day-to-day lives go unrecorded.
Anyways, what strikes me as odd about Jasper the Bear is his coloration. He’s mostly black, but his face and chest are white. He’s colored rather more like a penguin than any bear I’ve ever seen, even spirit bears. I can think of three possible reasons for this:
1. The original artist had never seen a real bear, and just painted it that way out of naïve ignorance.
2. It was originally painted all black, but this made for really bad pictures, so the Townsfolk painted it partially white to show up better in photos.
3. There was once a breed of Penguin Bears indigenous to, and perhaps unique to Jasper National Park, in much the same way as Kermode Bears are unique to a small section of the BC coast and islands.

Since #3 strikes me as the most reasonable, I am curious as to why this subspecies of bear has gone largely unnoticed. Note how Jasper seems to walk upright just like a penguin does. Perhaps they evolved during the last ice age, and can still be found in the recesses of the Colombia Icefields somewhere, cavorting on the glaciers and swimming in the alpine lakes. I propose an expedition to go and locate any surviving members of this species. Anyone want to come with?