Lake O’Hara Lodge: a timeless Rocky Mountain beauty
A Red Deer friend described Lake O’Hara Lodge in Yoho National Park, B.C., as the most beautiful place she’d ever been. My wife and I have done our share of travel to exotic and wonderful places so my expectations for our three-day visit to O’Hara were tempered with a grain of salt.
The lodge, accessible only by bus up a dusty gravel road, is tucked in the mountains west of Lake Louise. We were fortunate to secure a stay. Demand during the short summer season necessitates booking a year in advance – and priority is given to repeat clients, many of whom travel from around the globe to enjoy the natural beauty of this unique Rocky Mountain destination.
Our trip had an inauspicious beginning. The O’Hara bus departs daily for the lodge at 9 a.m. sharp from a parking lot near the Trans-Canada Highway. Rather than arise at 5 a.m. and drive from Red Deer to the O’Hara pickup spot, we elected to spend a night at a bed and breakfast in Field, B.C. It was record-breaking hot that evening. Dinner was excellent – rainbow trout on a bed of wild rice – but the moment we turned in for the evening the hotel power quit. No lights, no TV, no air conditioning; just darkness and heat.
A young woman came round with a flashlight in the pitch-black offering solace: “Wow, this happened last week, too. No power for 47 hours. We had to throw out most of our food.” I tossed and turned through the night’s sultry darkness, wondering whether my supper had endured the earlier blackout and was contemplating a fishy re-appearance.