I WAKE UP IN THE ROCKIES. THE RISING SUN IS LIGHTING THE TIPS OF THE MOUNTAINS AS WE ENTER THE BANFF NATIONAL PARK. LAST TIME I WAS HERE, IN THE SUMMER OF 1973, TERRY GILLIAM AND I CAME FOR A DAY TRIP. It’s only a couple of hours’ drive and we were taken by a publisher’s rep to a book festival at the Banff Hotel. Unfortunately we got rather drunk at lunch and misbehaved ourselves, and having somehow procured two water pistols we ran through the sedate exhibition halls shooting at pretty girls. This inexcusably boorish behavior was somehow forgiven on the grounds that we were from Monty Python, at which everyone relaxed and smiled and enjoyed the “joke.” Shameless days. The Canadians have always taken to Python. The screams for “Lumberjack” here are deafening.
The bright yellow morning light shines crisply on the pure white snow. Above us great gray granite peaks tower against the clear blue sky. We are traveling along a flat glacier bed, on a two-lane highway that we share with an oyster-colored river and a single-lane railway. Hanging valleys on either side drop into V-shaped, tree-lined funnels of snow. Frozen waterfalls hang suspended like icicles. Beside the road, snow-speckled Christmas trees are blasted with white. Black crows sit in the treetops or rise reluctantly from roadkill as we pass. We are traveling due west, with the sun low and golden behind us, intensifying as it rises, lighting the road ahead. The far mountains gleam like dentures in the sunlight, monstrous peaks and huge tubular piles of rock awesome in the yellow of the morning. Occasional plumes of snow like smoke are blown off their icy tops. In the chasm of the glacial valley we travel through the deep blue of the morning, staring up at awesome pillars of mountain piled high into mighty citadels. We pass beside great swirls of rock, folded and scooped and twisted by the earth. Everywhere the freckled fir trees flecked with icing sugar stand knee-deep in soft scoops of pure white sparkling snow. It is awesome to be here. Monumental. Inspiring. Like wandering through an Alpine travel brochure. The sky is Krishna blue, though it’s arctic cold outside our snug, warm bus. The girls are curled up under a blanket on the front seat next to ’Lish. We swallow hot chocolate as we ride through this winter wonderland. A river with frozen banks keeps us company. It is covered in wisps of icy breath, tiny mist clouds steaming in the morning light. The horizontal rays of the sun cast long shadows of the trees on the dazzling white landscape as we pass every possible shape of rock formation covered in thick, creamy blobs of snow.
We cross the Yoho valley into British Columbia, and are finally back on Pacific time. We pass an endless Canadian Pacific freight train to enter a town called Golden, with the Kicking Horse Hotel, where we are suddenly shrouded in white mist. These frozen clouds looked pretty till we entered them; now visibility is down to thirty feet and we are descending very slowly on the brakes. We are in a steep gorge and crawl to a standstill. The road has been closed here. Snow plows covered in snow sit by the roadside. An unfinished bridge is waiting for the spring. A single lane is open and as we pass through, the mountain peaks suddenly emerge from the mist and the sun comes out again revealing little cottages with smoking chimneys.
The hours pass. It’s very comfortable riding through this constantly changing snowscape. I flick on the TV to watch Arsenal playing Fulham on the satellite. It seems very decadent to lie in bed watching Sunday-afternoon soccer as this extraordinary landscape slides past. It’s certainly a long way from Highbury. There’s only an intermittent signal, so the game keeps freezing or breaking into surreal pixels or disappearing completely as we crawl under the lee of a great mountain.
We cross the mighty Columbia River and now we are traveling through a land of lakes; deep, wide waters, some completely frozen, others big, broad expanses of choppy blue fjord. They look like lochs and have odd names like Blind Bay and Salmon Arms. We stop for lunch in Kamloops at a very acceptable Grecian Italian restaurant, where the waitress asks me if I’m John Cleese. I tell her I’m Michael Palin.
We are so far north the sun never clears the mountaintops, it only staggers up so far and then sinks back, exhausted. The Rockies are behind us now but we still have four hours and two big climbs over the Sierras. Here the trees seem wider spaced, the mountains somehow less tortuous, but they are steep all right and packed with thicker snow, and we pass through some mighty deep chasms as the sun sets arctic green in the west. Lights in the valleys pop on, twinkling, and soon we are crawling into Sunday-night traffic, with Vancouver just a few klicks away. A towering high-rise with hot water and warm beds awaits us, and it’s a full twenty degrees warmer. But what a day. What an unforgettable journey.