Newbie and coming to your backyard!

[whitewolfdakota]

Hello to everyone from the Smokies of Tennessee. I found your site by accident and after reading your forum I can feel the warmth of a great bunch of folks. Had flying credits I had to book before Feb 6th and have always dreamed of visiting one of the only places prettier than my Smokey Mountains.My wife and I will be landing in Calgary April 29th and staying until May 8th. Since alot of  folks are always emailing me on advice about my back yard having TELLICO (North Carolina) and WINDROCK (Tennessee) , Smokey Mountain Nat. Park and Pigeon Forge/Gaitlandburg (Dollywood and tons of other stuff all within an hour of my house) I thought it would be fun to contact some brother/sister offroaders and pic their brains on where and what we shoud do. We are outdoors people (young 56 & 40) who love good company,good food and drink and just plain laughing. As I searched the internet I found a Hummer tour but found it out of business. I could hear my wife saying don't you get enough of that offroad stuff here at home? I am a club officer of Atomic City FourWheelers and have been going thru website hell with ours. I am the smallest of our extreme members and probably the least knowledgable having only been at it for about 12 yrs while my cohorts have been building,fabricating,tubing and machining these rigs their whole lives with an 87 YJ SO on 35's. I just got my 14 yr old a 74 CJ6( or so that's my excuse to the wife) lol.
     I haven't made any arrangements as of yet except the airline tickets getting us there. We're easy to please although my wife (who is the Mercedes Benz Service Manager here in Knoxville) has asked that we go horseback riding one time.(quite the spectrum between her cars and my rigs,lol) Other thoughts were dog sledding,hiking,seeing the country including Banff and Lake Louse,We wern't sure what we could do due to not knowing weather restraints/climate that time of the year. I hadn't even considered any offroad adventures until I saw your picture posts.WOW!!!!! Any and ALL emails would be greatly appreciated and maybe someday I can recipricate if any of you get down in my neck of the woods and experience our southern hospitality. I get visits from my old Florida club (South Florida Jeep Club) from time to time.........their environment is mud and swamp....they are like kids here in the mountains where they have to go and stop on a bridge to be 10ft above sea level.
     I know you want to see pics as we all do but mine are now limited due to a virus that wiped out 5 years of fantastic jeep'n. It broke my heart  and no , I was dumb as dirt not backing up the TONS of pics I had stored.
Here's a few crummy ones I have left:



automatic/258 I6/ 2100 Motorcraft carb/ NP 231 Rebuilt/ Transmission Cooler/ Stainless Borla Headers/Custom Exhaust system/ Slip Yoke Elimination Kit/ Custom Drive shafts/Tom Woods rear shaft Custom Trac Bar (D90 Radius Arm)/ Tera Hi Steer Knuckle/ Custom Drag Link/Custom Tie rod, both by RJCustoms/ Custom Springs w/ Rancho 9000 shocks all around/ 3" body lift/ reverse shackle kit/ Spring Over Application/ Warn HD Moly Shafts/ Warn Front freewheeling Hub Conversion/ Reverse Shackel Kit/ Detroit locker/ 4.56 gears/ Rear axle Dana 44/ Detroit Electrac Locker/ 4.56 gears/Custom Rear Disc Brakes SOURCE CO2 Tank & Regulator/ Outlaw wheels w/35x12.50 MTR Goodyear Wranglers/ 9.5ti warn winch/ KC drivers & fogs/ Optima Yellow Top/ Cobra PA/ gas cans/ Bulletproof rear bumper & tire carrier/Custom 2X4(1/4") Rock Sliders w/custom tube steps/ Bulletproof Front Bumper/KC Hi-Lites/Hella 530 Fog/Drivers/Warn 9.5ti winch/Rancho 9000 Shocks/Bullitproof Rear Bumper w/Tire Carrier/Hi-Lift Jack/3 ft Gorilla crowbar/Swaybar Disconnects(now in trash along with swaybar)/Alpine Stereo w/6 CD Changer/Cobra CB/Grant HiGrade Custom Wheel/Tuffy Stereo Security Console w/400 Watt Inverter/ Custom Full Cage w/Handles,Oh crap Bars and 12 Gussets by BradHead Fabricators/ Five Point racing harneses X4/ and other silly junk!Whew! John Cooper (WHITEWOLFDAKOTA)



I plan to become a regular here and hope I can be a positive addition. Please vist our club site even though I still think it's a disaster.

[Spinalguy]

Welcome,
i was lucky enough to drive 18 hours south of Toronto and wheel Tellico. i actually broke bad and headed thru Dolly land for a spectacular couple days in Gatlinburg. We than made it to Knoxville which was the depot for Mopar. We grabbed a new tie rod with 10 mins to spare before closing.
Beautiful scenery. We drove the Blue Ridge Mountains all the way down from Virginia.

Now we drive 18 hours south of Calgary to go to Moab.

Try here for some good times. http://howlingdogtours.com/


Tom

[dunl]

Quite the range?  I drive a 95 YJ and a 1980 300SD - both of you would like my choices. :lol:


BTW, love the CJ6.

[calltrex]

i just noticed the horn on the mirror.  nice

[apex]

welcome aboard. I'm sure there will be a run sometime during your visit. There are usually seats available on runs if you are interested.

Banff is nice but quite touristy. Lake Louise is very beautiful... lots of good camera spots. If you are the outdoorsy type, i'd suggest finding a hiking trail out near Canmore which is on the way to Banff. Something closer to the city would be Kananaskis Country which has an off road area, lots of camping, and many many hiking trails. Be sure to rent a car with unlimited millage.

The best thing about visiting Calgary is getting out of the city. The proximity to God's country is definitely a good reason to get out of the city.

1hour west is Mountains and Banff
1.5hour south are Waterton Lakes
1hour east will take you to the bad lands of Drumheller.

Check out these pages for some more info on our neck of the woods.

http://www1.travelalberta.com/en-ab/index.cfm?country=CA&state=AB&setlocale=1
http://www1.travelalberta.com/en-south/?CFID=6044523&CFTOKEN=27201261
http://www.albertaskananaskis.com/

A good day trip would be here...
http://www.braggcreek.ca/kananaskis/elbowfalls.htm

Good luck and drop me a PM if you have any questions... been living here a while.

[SwampSinger]

Welcome to the site !!!

There are all kinds of things to do around here if you like the outdoors. I'm from Eastern Canada (Quebec). I felt in love with Alberta 6 years ago and never look back. .

I also lived in Norris, TN in 1989 (Andreson County near Oakridge, TN) with the Irwins for a year on the Appalachian museum property (  http://www.museumofappalachia.com/ ). I love the Smokies and its residents. It was a time in my life that I will never forget.

I think you will like it up here. The Rockies are beautiful.

Welcome again.. and talk to you all soon.

Dom

[frenchy]

Welcome !!!

Too bad about your website... No backups?

Anyways, about your trip here...'dog sledding' ? not sure about that one, might have to go quite a bit farther north for that.

For horse back, I'd recommend Griffin Valley Ranch. Some nice scenery, they offer 4500 acres of un-guided (go where you want) trail rides. Guides also available if needed.
http://www.griffinvalleyranch.ca/index.htm

If you want hiking, you may aswell go while you're visiting banff. The gondola can take you to the top of sulphur mountain (2,281 m (7,486 feet) above sea level) where you can find a few other trails. You can hike up the trail to the summit too (Total Elevation Gain
 698 m (2,292 feet) ) I'd rather Gondola ride up, and hike down...   :lol:

http://www.banffgondola.com/

Oh, and don't forget to go soak in the hotsprings after all that Hiking...

http://www.hotspring.ca/

[cLAY]

Welcome !!!


Anyways, about your trip here...'dog sledding' ? not sure about that one, might have to go quite a bit farther north for that.

Not North just a bit west; http://howlingdogtours.com/.

 

[merlin]

there is also mad dogs and englishmen and snowy owl dogsled tours

[Asia]

One of my favourite hikes is the "Plain of the Six Glaciers" trail at Lake Louise, - spectacular mountain scenery, large glaciated peaks, the trail traverses several zones of flora and geography ending on moraines above a glacier with glaciers and peaks surrounding you.  There is also an alpine tea house near the end of the trail.  It's a full day hike and well worth the effort.  A spectacular mountain scenery drive is the trip from Lake Louise to Jasper, take a few days to include the viewpoints, short hikes and the Columbia Icefields.

That is a sharp looking YJ you have.

[whitewolfdakota]

Thanks for the warm welcome and especially the great tips on what to do. Looks like we're gonna have alot of great stories and adventures when we get back to our campfires in Tennessee. Catching a ride on one of your adventures would be icing on the cake! I hope my pm's to all of you got where they were supposed to be. Keep those suggestions coming and any tips on accomodations would help also. Looks like Canmore has alot of great inns like the Georgetown (that's where I spent my whole life growing up...Georgetown in Washington,D.C......yep, I'm originally a DC boy till college). We range from tents to Ritz Carlton but try not to be stupid about our funds. Karen says a fireplace would be nice for at least a few days. This Florida girl has never seen more than a dusting of snow and that was just two years ago. Boy, she's gonna love this trip!
     On another subject, I'm an avid hiker(Jeremiah Johnson type) and like the back country as much as air. I wonder if anyone knows about taking a knife with me. Karen laughs at me when I say I'd like to put my Cooper Bowie in my checked- in suitcase to have for hiking. I've been treed twice in Colorado (I stupidly was not afraid but you really do take notice when they lumber into your camp) and being a dumb arse stupidly walked upon a grizzly upwind in Montana. Obviously I was lucky cause I'm still here and he was only about 30 ft away.Not that my sharp tooth would do any good ( I can only hope for a deterrent)but it makes me feel better having a knife and a flint and a compass on me at all times in the woods. We just had a woman come upon a black bear with her two kids last summer while playing in a  swimming hole in the park. The female bear not only mauled the woman and her little boy (they are ok) but them hunted down the little girl who ran away during the comotion and tore her apart. These incedents are 1 in 10,000 but I don't want to be that one,lol!The cat mauling in California a few days ago further accents my concerns. I was lucky enough to find the knife maker whom the Cody museum commissioned to duplicate Jerimiah Johnson's hunting knife and he created a knife of my design and honored me by naming it after my family name (COOPER BOWIE). I know this sounds stupid but it has been a great friend and a few gators in Florida have felt my sharp tooth and probably saved a hunk of my hide.If possible I'd like to bring it with me. I guess I should call the airlines or maybe have it FEdEx'd up. I don't know what the rules and laws are for a knife (All the Park Rangers here know it as my Camp Utility knife.) but any imput positive or negative will be graciously recieved. Thanks again,John.


If anyone is interested in knife for a lifetime you can't do better than checking this family business  out:
http://www.ycsi.net/users/jolley/knives/knives.htm

[Asia]

You can carry your knife with you in the Provincial and National Parks.  You can also bring Bear Spray and Bear Bangers ( devices that shot a short distance and then explode creating a loud bang to scare a bear ).  I have carried bear spray and bangers, and my river rescue knife.  Luckily, I have never had to use any of them for defence.

[apex]

2nd that on the bear bangers or bear mace. You can buy them locally pretty easily. Canmore has seen an increase in bear activity lately.  There's a great pub in canmore... the name escapes me right now... I think it's a Rose and Crown or something like that. Really good food and beer.

[HIWYH8R]

Would the reason the name escapes you is the beer part of the pub?  :shock:

[merlin]

if you do deside to spend your time here in canmore drop me a line and i can let you in on all the sweet local hide outs. And the ar that you guys are thinking of i beleive is the Grizzly Paw pub. its the micro brew out hear with great award winning beers and awsome food (my friday hangout ) as for carrying a knife no prob, and right now there has been very little bear activity this winter but last summer was interesting..