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We take ourselves on retreats to rediscover lost things. Could be health, or peace of mind; could be eight whole hours of sleep. But those who trek into the untamed beauty of Banff National Park (Canada’s oldest such preserve) are after a re-acquaintance with something larger: the elements.
As the car winds toward our destination-Moraine Lake Lodge-my mind is working like a camera. The plates of the earth jut out, flanking the highway with million-year-deep cross-sections of the planet’s anatomy. Click. Dense stands of fir give up at an appointed altitude, and crowns of limestone and granite crack raw and totemic against the sky. Click. Beams of evening sunlight-real beams, as in a corny painting-set the mountainscape into high contrast. Click.
Luxury accommodations surrounded by natural beauty
The lodge itself is reached via 15 minutes of driveway that delivers visitors to the cobalt-blue edge of Moraine Lake. (Actually, the water’s colour shifts, cobalt to sapphire to a smoky turquoise, as rock and sunlight interact.) The famous Ten Peaks rise straight up from the far shore in the kind of impossible effect that makes you laugh in disbelief. Scrubbed glacial air falls onto the resort. In summer, upwards of 3,500 gawkers arrive daily. But only 66 of us get to sleep here.
David Hutton, co-owner of the lodge, commissioned Arthur Erickson to design this place in 1988 (at the height of Erickson’s powers). The architect made the journey to Moraine Lake and scouted the shoreline carefully before delivering a series of 18 cabins and the main lodge. His regard for the landscape is still obvious a quarter-century on. Every suite has the dreamed-for lake view. The pitch of the lodge’s dramatically extended roof mirrors a mountain peak called the Tower of Babel. And Erickson’s signature post-and-beam approach is evident, though it rubs a little against rustic cabin-kitsch decorations.
Dining under Arthur Erickson’s roof
Dinner is served in an intimate country dining room, where Erickson plays with his theme, turning the expected log ceiling into a lyrical glass expression. Like all his best work, the ceiling was experimental, cost a fortune and leaked. The glass curves fold the enormity of the view into a manageable parcel that guests can contemplate over a very decent rack of lamb.
I ask to take some grapefruit gelato up to the library, where I can enjoy it while taking in one of the nature talks delivered there. Tonight, a full house listens to a lecture about the hibernation habits of grizzlies.
By the sweetly childish hour of 10, everyone trundles to bed. The lodge furnishes its guests with no televisions or telephones, by Hutton’s instruction, which has the effect of syncing your sleep schedule with the setting sun.
And you’re up with the sun, too. \
After a day of hiking, an impromptu dinner with a London photographer winds through a healthy share of wine, some choice Alberta beef tenderloin and a debate as to whether the oil sands should count as a "limited" resource. The lodge is permanently infested with photographers, painters and journalists like us. These are the mountains the Group of Seven painters were trying to show us. (The vista is printed on the old $20 bills.) Here, undeniable beauty knocks aside your chirping iPhone, turning it into the intrusive piece of plastic it is.
Disconnect like a real mountain man
On my last morning I have coffee with Hutton, and we talk about what he’s built here, with Erickson’s help. He’s worried about the wifi some are pressuring him into, which could resuscitate all those strangled cellphones and laptops. He talks simply and clearly, like a real mountain man: "I don’t want a bunch of drones, you know? I want them to get out there, explore." (Note:wifi has since been installed.)
All too soon, I’m retracing the road back toward civilization. If I lean out the window a little I can take one final mental picture. It’s of a considered life where wild beauty is a given-not an "escape." Click. It’s a good picture to bring back to the city. wl
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The Great Man in the Great Park
If the contribution of Canada’s greatest architect weren’t enough, the greatest American architect, Frank Lloyd Wright, designed a nearby pavilion, too. In 1911, Banff was just gaining its reputation (as was Wright). The feds commissioned him to deliver a building befitting the area’s magnificence. A prairie-style structure, with his trademark geometries and expansiveness, was situated on the Bow River, where it earned the disdain of locals (whose heads the feds had gone over). Frequent flooding ensued and the pavilion sank partway into marsh-Wright’s buildings, like Erickson’s, are often permeable to nature, in a good sense and a bad. The pavilion-one of only two Wright designs ever built in Canada-was torn down in 1938.
For Extra Credit
A great resource for anyone interested in the architecture of Banff is the Whyte Museum of the Canadian Rockies (111 Bear St., Banff, 403-762-2291, whyte.org). It’s the repository of all things archival in the area and is anything but a stuffy study lab. The attached museum features some of the best curated art exhibitions in the province-this summer the theme is Alberta’s women artists and adventurers.
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