Lake Louise

“It seems like we’re about a month behind what we would normally see for snow amounts."

“There’s less food up high so we have more bears staying in the valley later and that’s coinciding with an increase in tourist use,” said Laura Nicholson, resource management officer for Banff National Park.

“The prediction part of it was the difficult part because of the unknown of what the impact of COVID is. I don’t think we are out of the COVID element, and that impact will be on our international student program. We are unsure if borders will close again.”

“The tourism master plan will become the guidepost for sustainable tourism here and we want community feedback.”

“The bottom line of our driver shortage is we’re going to have to adjust some service levels from what was planned. ... It’s not unique to the Bow Valley. I think we tend to see it more than other areas because of the cost of housing and trying to get people to move here. It’s challenging. This is the first year we have been significantly short of drivers and not being able to find enough quality applicants to fill all the seats we need.”

“I really hope people take away an additional love for wolves and apex predators like wolves that there are so many interesting stories to tell out there about wolves that we don’t even know about. This is just one pack of maybe hundreds in B.C. and Alberta and one of 1000’s in Canada. It’s a story I was fortunate enough to tell for five-and-a-half years and I hope people really enjoy it and foster their love and desire to care for wolves.

PHOTOS: The past week in photography in the Bow Valley

PHOTOS: The past week in photography in the Bow Valley

One can’t help but notice the abundance of help wanted signs in the Bow Valley.

“The biggest impact we will see is fewer ambulances out of the Bow Valley heading into Calgary. That is the key thing we are going to be watching.”