The Canadian I - The Rockies (Vancouver to Edmonton)

So on Tuesday I started the first trip on my North American Rail Pass - 30 days of unlimited travel on any VIA (Canadian) or Amtrak (US) train. My first journey was eastbound on a route called "The Canadian", as per the picture below.

The train goes from Vancouver to Toronto, stopping at major cities as well as smaller towns (on request). No stop is longer than an hour so the trip from Vancouver to Toronto would take 2days, 23hours and 30m. I decided there was no way I'd be able to stay on a train that long without going mental so I decided to stop in Edmonton. The train left Vancouver 17:30, Tues 11 April and arrived in Edmonton at 17:30, Wed 12 April.

The scenery on this leg of the trip was simply stunning - I'd thought I wouldn't be able to see a lot as much of the trip through the rockies was at night time, but it was a full moon which meant that it was quite light outside and the moonlight was reflected off all the snow on the mountains. I hardly slept that night - the surroundings were too breathtakingly magical to spend time with my eyes closed!

Unfortunately I couldn't get any night shots but here are some from Wednesday day.

This really doesn't do it justice as the scale and grandeur isn't captured, but hey it gives you an idea!

Mt Robson, the tallest mountain in the Rockies, standing at 3954m

We stopped in Jasper at some point on wednesday, this is a shot of the town with the mountains of Jasper National Park in the background.

And this is me posing with Jasper the Bear, the town mascot. (I couldn't help it, he looked so cute ;)