After a lot of exploring over the first few days of the trip, we had planned for today to be a relaxing day. No visit to the Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel is complete without a visit to the Willow Stream Spa, and that was the primary activity we had planned!

We took a break from the spa to grab some lunch, and then walked around the hotel grounds. The weather today was much clearer than previous days, and you could actually see some blue sky. There was still some haze, but we at least had a temporary reprieve from the thick smoke. We’ll take what we can get.

The groundskeepers do a great job with the flowers!

Lots of people enjoying the lovely outdoor pool.

Brian and Katherine had gone down to the river to explore, while Nadine and I went on a little drive, up to the hot springs. We then met up and did some evening exploring together.

With the break in the weather, we headed over to the Vermillion Lakes, which are normally a nice spot in the late evening sunlight.

There were lots of birds around, including these ducks right next to the first dock.

I managed to get a nice shot of this very friendly dragonfly mid-flight.

We continued driving up the Vermillion Lakes Road to the end.

After about an hour at the Vermillion Lakes, we headed into town for some ice cream.

Back at the hotel, Nadine and I returned to the Willow Stream Spa for a nice soak in the plunge pools before bed.

And with no recent rain or change in the wind, we awoke today to again find widespread smoke. We’re really not having much luck here! With such horrible skies, there’s not much point in going up a gondola or hiking anywhere for a view, so we pretty much stuck close to town.

We started with the typical drive over to Surprise Corner for the classic shot of the Banff Springs Hotel across the Bow River.

OK, maybe the classic photo from this spot doesn’t have this much smoke, but you get the idea!

It would have been nice to do a hike up Tunnel Mountain, but since there’s not much point in doing that in the current conditions, we instead continued around it, and walked out to the hoodoos.

We watched a number of people on stand-up paddleboards move swiftly along the Bow River below us. In the photo below, you can’t see it, but the Banff Springs Hotel is perched majestically in the centre of the frame, above the river with Sulphur Mountain towering above. You need to use your imagination here!

Since we were here, and we’d never hiked it before, we continued hiking around “The Toe” mountain bike trail. I highlighted our route in orange on the map below.

I don’t know what animal piled all of this up.

We continued around the rest of the loop. It was a mix of hiking above and along the Bow River, then into the trees and down into thicker forest, before climbing back up again next to the Cascade River.

After finishing our hike, we took a drive up the Norquay Road. We were lucky enough to spot this guy in the woods along the first switchback!

We continued up the road to the lookout. Again, you need to use your imagination. That’s the Town of Banff below us, with the Vermillion Lakes on the right.

When walking around this area, you need to watch out for holes in the ground made my the Columbian ground squirrels.

We spent a bit of time wandering around the base of the Mt. Norquay Ski Area, and then returned to the hotel.