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JASPER NATIONAL PARK (CANADA) |
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| Yellowhead Highway and Athabasca River--Jasper National Park |
| Founded in 1907 as Canada's sixth national park, Jasper National Park is the largest wilderness park in the Canadian Rockies. It is an integral part of the UNESCO Rocky Mountain World Heritage Site, and one of the core parts of the largest national park system in the world. |
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| View from Whistler's Mountain |
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| Fryatt Valley |
| Jasper was named after Jasper Hawes, who operated a trading post in the region for the North West Company. Before this it was referred to as Fitzhugh. The park was established on September 14, 1907 as Jasper Forest Park, and was granted national park status in 1930, with the passing of the National Parks Act. |
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| Mount Edith Cavell |
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| Melting Toe of Athabasca Glacier |
| Jasper is the wildest of the mountain parks, and contains a superb backcountry trail system as well as the world famous Columbia Icefields, one of the only Icefields in the world accessible by road.
Since more snow falls in a year than can melt during the short summer season, it accumulates. As time passes, the snow transforms into ice and begins to flow outward through gaps in the mountains surrounding the icefield, creating great tongues of ice called glaciers. The Athabasca is the most-visited glacier on the North American continent. Situated across from the Icefield Centre, its ice is in continuous motion, creeping forward at the rate of several centimeters per day. Spilling from the Columbia Icefield over three giant bedrock steps, the glacier flows down the valley like a frozen, slow-moving river. Because of a warming climate, the Athabasca Glacier has been receding or melting for the last 125 years. Losing half its volume and retreating more than 1.5 kms, the shrinking glacier has left a moonscape of rocky moraines in its wake. |
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| Columbia Icefield |
| The Columbia Icefield is a surviving remnant of the thick ice mass that once mantled most of Western Canada's mountains.
Lying on a wide, elevated plateau, it is the largest icefield in the Canadian Rockies. Nearly three-quarters of the park's highest peaks are located close to the icefield; ideally placed to catch much of the moisture that Pacific winds carry across the British Columbia interior. Most of this precipitation falls as snow; up to 7 metres a year! Source material taken from the Jasper National Park website and other websites. |
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| The Skyline Trail |
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The Skyline Trail |
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The Skyline Trail |
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Terminal Mountain |
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Sunwapta Falls |
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Cavell Glacier |
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