Angel Glacier, Canadian Rockies

Angel Glacier is a fairly easy-to-visit glacier on Mount Edith Cavell, not far from Jasper in the Canadian Rockies. I visited it in 2000 with my late wife Wendy (that's her you see hiking in front of the glacier in the first photo below). It was about the second week of July and we'd hiked up a few miles to get to this point. I remember our wariness about the chances of meeting a grizzly. One had been reported about a week earlier in roughly the same area. So I had a bear bell tied to my pack, and I made sure to keep shaking it every few minutes. However, the only wild animal we saw all day was a hoary marmot on a rock about 100m away.

Here's a clearer view of Angel Glacier and it's moraine lake, on the same day in July 2000. At this time of year the glacier was probably at its maximum seasonal extent. Some of the high passes in the Rockies were still blocked by snow. A few days earlier we were very lucky to see glacier lilies in flower in the car park at Peyto Lake. I'd never heard of these flowers, and probably wouldn't even have noticed them if a Canadian lady hadn't pointed them out to us. They bloom only for a few days at the beginning of the thaw; just as the snow starts to melt, these tiny yellow lily-like flowers peek out through the snow.

For comparison, here's how Angel Glacier used to look (http://peel.library.ualberta.ca/pcimages/PC/008/web/PC008385.jpg). This picture is undated, but I would guess it's probably around the 1930s - 40s. Here you can see how the glacier got its name, an almost perfect angel figure with a long flowing robe around her feet and outstretched wings held high.  By 2000, the angel had been amputated just below her waist. Today, seventeen years on, I imagine the 'toe' is probably well up her thorax.