JASPER NATIONAL PARK - Canadian Rockies: Including Banff and Jasper National Parks - page 318

PARK ENTRY
Permits are required for entry into the park. A National Parks Day Pass is adult
$9.80, senior $8.30, child $4.90, up to a maximum of $20 per vehicle. It can also
be used in neighboring Banff National Park if you're traveling down the Icefields
Parkway and is valid until 4pm the day following its purchase. An annual Discovery
Pass -good for entry into all of Canada's national parks and historic sites-is adult
$67.70, senior $57.90, child $33.30, up to a maximum of $136.40 per vehicle.
Both types of pass can be purchased at the park information center, at the booth
along the Icefields Parkway a few kilometers south of the town of Jasper, and at
campground kiosks. If you're traveling north along the Icefields Parkway, you'll be
required to stop and purchase a park pass just beyond Lake Louise (Banff National
Park). The Parks Canada website ( www.pc.gc.ca ) has detailed pass information.
Jasper is delightful in winter. You can spend your time doing all the same activities
as in Banff, but without the pizzazz of Banff Avenue and the crowds of the Lake Louise
and Sunshine Village ski resorts. Most of the wintertime action revolves around skiing
and boarding at Marmot Basin, but you can also try cross-country skiing or snowshoeing,
walk through an ice canyon, and take a sleigh ride. In the evening, you can kick back in
front of a roaring fire knowing that you're paying a lot less for lodging than you would be
in Banff.
THE LAND
Although the peaks of Jasper National Park are not particularly high, they are among the
most spectacular along the range's entire length. About 100 million years ago, layers of
sedimentary rock—laid down here up to a billion years ago—were forced upward, folded,
and twisted under tremendous pressure into the mountains seen today. The land's contours
were further altered during four ice ages that began around one million years ago. The last
ice age ended about 10,000 years ago, and the vast glaciers began to retreat. A remnant of
this final sheet of ice is the huge Columbia Icefield; covering approximately 325 square
kilometers (125 square miles) and up to 400 meters (1,300 feet) deep, it's the most extens-
ive ice field in the Rocky Mountains. As the glaciers retreated, piles of rock melted out and
were left behind. Meltwater from the glaciers flowed down the valleys and was dammed