Day 12 - Banff to Lake Louise via Lake Minnewanka

 23 December 2025

 It is amazing how long it can take to pack up two kids when they have been settled in a location for more than a couple of days. After time spent trying to gather all the belongings we were on our way to Lake Louise. Our first stop though was to Lake Minnewanka and Two Jack Lake. 

As I mentioned in a previous post, Lake Minnewanka, which is huge, had been almost completely frozen on our first visit 6yrs ago. I have videos of Joshua and Isabelle both doing a snow angel at this very location. This was said to be unusual though. Today at the Lake, the kids were probably walking on the very edges of ice and you could see slush forming in some parts of the lake that were close to the shore.

We were out there somewhat early so were able to enjoy fresh snow and make some of the first foot prints. It appears that our two amazing kids are growing up however, as previous visits felt like hours. The strong desire for Joshua and Isabelle to throw cold stones into iced waters or to paint nearly frozen water onto frozen stones has been replaced with a strong desire to move on and find a warm car. 

These photos were taken late morning, although you wouldn't know by the lighting. We are continue to be tricked by the very short days and early loss of lighting which is even more apparent in the Rockies.

The kids do like to laugh at Steve's attempt at selfies. Oops, sorry, the word selfie isn't cool anymore. Although there does not appear to be a replacement word. 

Two Jack Lake actually joins to Lake Minnewanka. This lake had all the appearances of being completely frozen, however without a local to ask we didn't dare venture too far out beyond the steps of someone else prior to us. 

Apparently it was too cold for me to ask the kids to sit in the red deck chairs for a photo. 
Funnily enough, once they were in they didn't want to get out. 

Final destination today and until after Christmas is Lake Louise. Of course, as always, the Chateau was decorated and beautifully festive. We had a beautiful newly decorated room in the newer wing of the hotel - but we didn't care. We had the most amazing view of the mountain and a corner of the lake. After adding on some layers, we headed out to explore around the lake.

Although we had been told that the lake had recently frozen over, the mushy spots where our feet could slip into at certain points did not give us a lot of confidence that the lake was frozen solid. In previous visits, the frozen castle sat firmly on the centre entrance to the lake. This was conspicuously absent from the shore line. It was another two days before we learnt that the castle had fallen into the lake prior to Christmas because the lake hadn't frozen sufficiently and weather changes warmed the lake back up. We thought the current -10C was cold enough, but apparently it should have been -20C.  

Poking holes in the ice. 

Christmas decorations in the new hotel wing. 

What we love about this hotel is how much there is to explore, especially at this time of the year when they open up some of the ballrooms for Christmas entertainment for families. They had it set up with a bar for Christmas cocktails and fancy hot chocolates for the kids. We spent a couple of our evenings in this room playing Uno. 

By the time dinner finished it had started snowing big beautiful fluffy snow flakes. 

It might be difficult to see but you can see the Christmas tree lights on the snow filled Christmas outside behind Steve's head. 

The Christmas Tree in the main lobby of the Chateau. 

The tree's outside of the hotel entrance. 

We were going to be here for Christmas so it was time for us to put 
up our fold up tree. We picked this up in NYC and it has hitch hiked
with us for each of our Christmas holidays since then. A few
decorations were added from some gifts that I picked up for the
kids in the conveniently located Christmas shop in Banff.