Yoho National Park
Earlier this week, I traveled to Yoho National Park, west of Lake Louise in British Columbia. This area is a longtime favourite of mine and my companion on this occasion, Bob Bear.
This post is structured as a story, chronicling the Kicking Horse River’s path over a distance of ~10 km, between its confluence with the Yoho and where the Emerald River joins it.
This first picture of rapids in the Yoho River was taken just upstream from The Confluence, where the Kicking Horse River flows into the Yoho. Thanks to the late arrival of summer this year, the water volume in these rivers remains high, producing spectacular rapids and waterfalls.
This picture features the afore-mentioned Confluence, where the Kicking Horse joins the Yoho. Everything after that is the Kicking Horse River. The picture below shows the aqua-coloured water (above) of the Kicking Horse, joining the muddy-looking Yoho, flowing across the bottom of the image. The aqua-coloured water of the Kicking Horse is blended with that of the Yoho and assumes the less attractive muddy-looking colour. More aqua water later enters the Kicking Horse where it joins with the Emerald River (last photo, below).
Our next stop is a popular tourist attraction, the Natural Bridge. That’s the Kicking Horse River dropping below the “bridge” near the top of the image. The bridge was formed over the years by the water’s erosion of the rock. There is no longer a bridge spanning the river, but rather a channel through the rock, below.
This photograph shows the Kicking Horse River, plunging into the channel, flowing beneath the Natural Bridge.
This scene was taken at the bottom of the canyon, downstream from the Natural Bridge. It features an interesting sedimentary rock structure on the opposite bank. One would normally expect the rock’s layers to be horizontal, rather than vertical. Tectonic activity has re-oriented the layers, producing this unusual result.
Bob and I took a familiar stroll, down an old road that parallels the Kicking Horse River. We soon came upon a bridge that crosses the Emerald River, at the point where it merges with the Kicking Horse. Note the aqua-coloured water from Emerald Lake, 27 km upstream.
Today’s final image shows the merging of the Emerald River’s aqua-coloured water with the yellow/greenish muddy-looking water of the Kicking Horse. At this point, the two streams have not blended into a single colour. In the absence of churning rapids and plunging waterfalls, it takes longer to create the mix.
That brings me to the end of the story I promised. The Kicking Horse continues its westward course another 60 km to Golden B.C., where it joins and becomes part of the Columbia River.