Another dreary day today, but no longer actively raining so we took off at 11am to do the day's adventures. There were so many options that it was hard to decide which hike or site to start with. So we headed to Five Lakes trailhead, but found that it had a small parking lot and it was completely full - cars were parking on the side of the highway, but it was an uneven tilt, so I did not feel comfortable parking the big bus on that edge - felt like my RV might just roll over! So we drove back down the parkway, looking for a better parking space, but instead found an inlet to the Athabasca River access - a picnic area and a trail that lead down to the river. The river is that green gray and rapidly flowing, very pretty to watch. We started down the trail, unprepared for a hike (no bear spray) since we thought it would just be a short trail, but actually got a little nervous when we saw how far we had walked into the woods - again doing our noise of talking, singing, and letting Sara run free. We also climbed over a few fallen trees, but the path was well marked. When we started to get nervous, we turned around and headed back, then prepared lunch in the RV and ate it at the riverside. Very relaxing and pretty! Now we decided to give the Five Lakes trail parking a chance, but still found it full, so drove south to Athabasca Falls, which we had planned to do tomorrow. It was probably 30 miles south of Jasper, but a sight to behold!! The Athabasca River starts at the Columbia glacier Icefields of these Canadian Rockies and flows north to join the McKenzie River and spill into the Arctic Ocean. The falls are very close to the main parkway, but we spent over an hour exploring the area. At the top of the falls the views are of a very powerful waterfall, then you can walk down to lower levels and see where the water has eaten away the rock creating canyons, and then down to the calm basin below where you walk out onto a rocky beach and all is quiet. The falls area is about 20 degrees cooler than the basin, so it was a bit chilly. We also had about 60 steps of stairway to reach the base and then return. Then we walked upstream and followed another path along the river. The wildflowers and berries are blooming (watch for bear when the red "buffalo berries" are blooming!) This location was very busy with tourists, but not too crowded since there is so much space to explore. As we headed back toward Jasper, we pulled into Horseshoe Lake, on a lark! It had parking, so we stopped! You can't see anything from the road, but we hiked in a short distance, and discovered one end of the "horseshoe" - dark aquamarine, clear water - you could see the outline of the rock formations down to the bottom!! We had to do a little mountain climbing to follow the path, but the views were gorgeous!! We just sat on a peak for 30 mins enjoying the peace. The we heard voices and splashes - some young boys were jumping off the cliffs into that frigid water!! We had to leave before they harmed themselves or developed hypothermia! And now we drove into town to purchase our Skywalk tickets for tomorrow and get gas again. Stopped for dinner at a restaurant (Villa Caruso Steakhouse and Bar) with second story views of the town - feels like the tea shoppes of Germany where you can watch all the activity in town, except serving Alberta beef and Kokannee beer. The food was not great, but the ambience of "cabin with a view" (and Internet!) made it worth the meal. But better get back to Sara soon and back to Whistler Campground for another night - plan tomorrow is to be out early as we have tickets for the skywalk at 3pm and stops along the Icefields Parkway before that! Upon return to our campsite, I discover my leveling boards have disappeared - hate to think someone stole them, maybe they thought we were gone and forgot them, but now I'll need to get some new leveling boards, and hope I don't need them before I can buy some (would like to wait to buy them in US currency!)