Driving up to Jasper, we saw signs of flooding on the Icefields Parkway. There were dozens of spots where creeks carried rocks onto the road. We didn’t notice damage or repairs on the highway, but it would have needed a lot of plowing and cleaning, once the water subsided.
We also saw spots on the mountainsides where the rock looked raw, as if these were newly exposed layers. Perhaps these were the sources of all the rock brought down in the flooding.
We drove out to Mount Edith Cavell to see the glacier and the tiny icebergs floating in the lake, but the path up the valley had been wiped out a year ago, when a chunk of glacier fell into the lake and caused a tsunami of rock, mud and water. The flood zone of debris was uncomfortably familiar.
I think we’re getting a massive lesson in impermanence. And yet – it’s still all beautiful.
Maureen
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