Then there are the ground squirrels, which produce a constant beeping like a smoke alarm with a dying battery. Irritating perhaps, but effective for locating them. Walking through the meadows around Jasper, I spotted countless of these little creatures through the long grass, standing upright on their hind legs and scanning their surroundings like meerkats. <\/p>\n
The chipmunks deserve their own mention. As I made my way up the winding path of Sulphur Mountain, chipmunks bounded alongside the track, darting in and out of burrows cut into the hillside. They seemed entirely unbothered by humans passing through their neighbourhood. <\/p>\n
One chipmunk I spotted on Sulphur Mountain.<\/p>\n
At the snow-dusted summit, I was greeted by an even more impressive resident toddling along. A large fluffy ball known as a marmot, which has perfectly adapted to the snowy landscape. It mulled about with complete indifference as a small crowd gathered to take photos. <\/p>\n
Deer and elk <\/p>\n
Moving up in size, deer are a constant presence throughout the Rockies. On my morning runs, I regularly startled groups dozing peacefully by the side of the track. Instead of scrambling at the slightest sound like most deer would, these chaps must know they\u2019re protected in a national park. They looked more bothered about me trampling through their land and disrupting their slumber. <\/p>\n
Elks are enormous animals, the bulls weighing up to 500kg. Photo \/ 123rf<\/p>\n
I couldn\u2019t get as close to the next member of the deer family, the elk. These are enormous animals, the bulls weighing up to 500kg. I spotted elk plenty in the woods, but also in the neighbourhoods of Banff and Jasper. I was surprised to learn that come springtime, mother elk pose one of the biggest threats to anyone who gets too close, especially selfie-loving tourists. <\/p>\n
Mountain sheep and goats <\/p>\n
As the roads climbed higher into the alpine zones, the elk and deer gave way to rockier terrain and a different cast of characters. Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep were a common sight on the steep rocky hillsides, their thick brown fleeces blending remarkably well into the hostile landscape. The rams were the most impressive with their iconic twirling horns. Along the Icefields Parkway they gathered in groups, checking out the tourists passing through. <\/p>\n
How do mountain goats manage this adrenaline junkie lifestyle? Photo \/ Jon Sailer, Unsplash<\/p>\n
The cooler cousin of sheep, in my view, is the elusive mountain goat, which I hadn\u2019t even considered I\u2019d see on this trip.However, while scanning the impossibly steep cliffs, I saw a white speck standing out against the grey stone. The hillside was vertical with only tiny slivers of indentations and holds in the rock. It blows my mind how the goats manage this adrenaline junkie lifestyle. Seeing it in person made it even more surreal. <\/p>\n
Bears <\/p>\n
Despite many great creature encounters, bears were what I had been thinking about since before I boarded the plane to Canada. Throughout the trip, I kept my eyes trained on every tree line, hoping I\u2019d see one, with the nursery rhyme \u201cWe\u2019re going on a bear hunt\u201d firmly replaying in my mind. Our tour director Lynda, even played the Teddy Bears\u2019 Picnic on the bus in an attempt to lure our furry friends. <\/p>\n
Bears were what I had been thinking about since before I boarded the plane. Photo \/ Delaney Van, Unsplash<\/p>\n
Seeing the bear-proof bins, bear warning signs and being reassured by a number of Canadians that they were a relatively common sight had reassured me that I\u2019d see at least one. However, as our time in the Rockies drew to a close, I began to make peace with the prospect I\u2019d miss out. Then, on the final drive out of Jasper, a black bear appeared standing upright in a roadside ditch. Minutes later, we pulled over to watch a mother and two cubs foraging in the grass verge, close enough to see the cubs playing together. The family was completely unbothered by our presence. It struck me then what a privilege it was to watch from the coach. <\/p>\n
That sighting must have broken some kind of seal. Bears appeared for the rest of the drive, including several cubs, with more sightings than we could count. <\/p>\n
Maybe it was the song. <\/p>\n
Checklist<\/p>\n
CANADA<\/p>\n
GETTING THERE<\/p>\n
Fly from Auckland to Vancouver with Air New Zealand, then on to Calgary with Air Canada.<\/p>\n
DETAILS<\/p>\n
The journalist travelled courtesy of Cosmos Tours.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Then there are the ground squirrels, which produce a constant beeping like a smoke alarm with a dying…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":531275,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[95,36031,13312,8615,221500,33527,222,60893,78,18917,21524,111,139,69,138234,262202,147,223,29451,406],"class_list":["post-531274","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-and","tag-bears","tag-canadian","tag-come","tag-elk","tag-encounters","tag-fast","tag-goats","tag-in","tag-lachlan","tag-mountain","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-rennie","tag-rockies","tag-science","tag-the","tag-thick","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531274","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=531274"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531274\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/531275"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=531274"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=531274"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=531274"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}