We had booked a campsite for our recurring late-season trip to Jasper back in early July, looking forward to what we were calling Campsgiving Weekend.
By the end of the month though, wildfire proximity had prompted the evacuation of the entire townsite and many structures in the town and surrounding area were lost, including some in the Wapiti campsite where we were booked.
In late August, Parks Canada refunded our fees and cancelled our reservation, but with word that Miette Hot Springs might reopen before the end of the season, I booked a campsite at Jasper Gates, just west of Hinton.
Sure enough, Miette announced they would be open until Thanksgiving weekend, so we loaded up Bride of Frankentrailer and hit the road Friday, but the trailer got a flat on the Henday before we even reached St. Albert.
We called Tuber Towing because I wasn't about to change a flat on that thing beside Edmonton's fastest roadway, but they also told us the other tire wasn't looking great. So we ended up leaving it at Trail Tire so they could replace both of them - the tech didn't think the other would even get us out of the city... They hoped to get us underway late the next morning, but once we got home I transferred our reservation from the campsite to a motel room on the same property (Jasper Gates was so nice about it too!) so we could get to the mountains on Friday after all.
After cooking French toast in out kitchenette and visiting the hot springs (perhaps our favourite spot in the Rockies), we bought a park pass there and drove into the townsite. We wanted to see for ourselves just what was left of a place all three of us knew from our childhoods.
It is about a half-hour from Miette Road to Jasper, following the Athabasca river for the most part. Along the Yellowhead, the visible destruction was limited to the burnt trees you could see on the mountain slopes across the water. As you got closer to town, however, there were burnt trees on both sides of the river, some of them very close to the highway. (All the photos are Glory's.)
The eastern entry way to the town was closed so we drove on to the western one on Hazel Avenue that comes off of 93A. Last year we had seen an immense grizzly bear lounging in the shade of the trees by the intersection - almost all those trees were now gone, a few scorched trunks all that remained.
Heading up to Connaught Drive, the main drag that parallels the train tracks, I audibly gasped - almost everything west of Hazel Avenue was gone, starting with the gas stations that had been on the corner, and all the homes that had been beyond it. My eyes dampened and I questioned my presence there.
On Connaught itself, the damage is less visible save for a gaping hole where a building housing some businesses or another used to exist. Presumably, firefighters knocked it down to save the neighbouring structures.
Looking across the tracks, the proximity of the fire from the other side is visible as well, and a ridgeline of burnt timber is particularly haunting.
We turned up Pyramid Lake Road, noting Bears Paw Bakery, a staple of prior visits, is closed. Patricia Street is currently one-way, so we went up to Geike Street and hung a left, noting that everything east of us looked largely intact.
But a few blocks down we came upon the burned out remains of Jasper Anglican Church, and a sign on the fence surrounding it warning of asbestos in the ruins. It was consecrated almost a century ago, in 1929.
Turning left on Hazel so we could proceed down Patricia Street, we saw a fire-damaged garage that was still standing and probably reparable, but with no obvious burning of the adjacent house - miraculous. Past that street though, there were almost no structures standing.
Just before Patricia Street, north of the Esso station, I think this was a steakhouse or Greek restaurant with a retro blue and white sign - almost nothing remains.
On Patricia Street we saw a section of stores and restaurants where the bottom floor was largely intact, but the roof and upper floors were gutted, with exposed roof beams silhouetted aginst the bright blue sky. But of course, even if this building doesn't require demolition, all the contents are undoubtedly wrecked by smoke or water damage.
All in all, a pretty disheartening visit. So much damage, so quickly, and impacting thousands if not tens of thousands of people. How does a small town come back from the edge of destruction like this? I had hoped we could shop or grab a light meal there, and even though I knew such an act would be fine, it still felt ghoulish somehow, so we headed back to our motel near Hinton.
But before we left, Glory wanted a picture of her with the cartoon bear namesake of the town, and I was happy to oblige.
Somehow the fact that this statue had survived gave me a glimmer of hope, as did seeing the mountain sheep and elk so prevalent on the way out of town.
From the highway, the signs of the fire are much less visible, and in time, I hope the townsite will look more familiar as well.
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