The Hall of the Gods was coined by a trail blazing female adventure seeker from the early 1900's, Mary Schaffer. Back then it was rare for women to explore the backcountry, especially on their own. It's even more impressive when you realize that she only had a small hand drawn map from a Nakoda First nation's friend to go on. And, at the time finding Maligne Lake was a 6-month backcountry expedition. The Hall of the Gods is a fitting name for this part of Maligne Lake. Here, the mountains rise steeply out of the water and are the highest mountains on the lake. Knowing that this is a spiritual place for First Nations people and that they believed the mountains are the embodiment of their ancestors, the name seems even more fitting.

At 17.7km from boat launch, the Spindly Creek Picnic Area is the only rest stop on the southern half of Maligne Lake. There are big signs to mark the picnic areas around the lake making them easy to see from the water. All the picnic areas around the lake have fire pits, picnic tables and pit toilets. Since it is cool in the shade during the fall, we opted to sit on the beach and to enjoy the sun and the spectacular views.

One interesting fact about Maligne Lake is that the colour of the water changes the further south you go. On the northern end of the lake the water is very blue and crystal clear, however the further south you travel the water becomes more emerald around Spirit Island and finally turquoise near Coronet Creek. This is because there is more rock flour in the water here from the three glaciers around the lake.

Coronet Creek is the last campground on Maligne Lake, it is at the far south end of the lake. It is even more tranquil than the other already peaceful campgrounds because there are no tour boats back here. This southern half of Maligne Lake is only accessible by paddling or a boat that has a small electric motor. To preserve the pristine nature of the lake no gas-powered boats, other than the cruises are permitted. Coronet Creek Campground only has 8 campsites here which means that over crowding will never be an issue. This ensures that adventure seekers will have a quiet experience to fully enjoy this pristine lake and the rocky mountain wilderness surrounding it.

I have awarded Coronet Creek the best firepit on Maligne lake award. What could be better than enjoying a fire by the lake with these incredible views, watching the sunset and the starry night emerge in the world's second largest dark sky preserve? Probably, not much.

In the fall, the sun is low in the sky throughout the day. Although sunrise this time of year is around 8:00am, it wasn't until 11:00am that the sun finally peaked around the mountain warming up the campground. I was refilling our water bottles from the dock on what was a cool morning, as soon as the sun poked around the corner and hit my back, I was instantly warm.

We decided to spend 2 nights at Coronet Creek so that we could spend our non-canoeing day hiking the Henry MacLeod Trail on Maligne Lake. This is a hiking trail that is only accessible by first paddling 21.3km to Coronet Creek Campground. It is 8km one way that leads to a rustic wilderness campsite beyond which adventure seekers can explore the moraines of a glacier.

This time of year, we had no problems following the trail. Someone placed stone markers, well piles of rocks along the route to help adventure seekers spot the trail. This trail is unmaintained; however it was in better shape than most of the maintained trails we hiked this year. Ironic, don't you think?

Even though it is the afternoon, the sun is still low in the sky as it peaks through the trees. We had a late start to this hike while we waited for the day to warm up. We hiked about 6.5 km of the 8km trail as we wanted to be back at Coronet Creek during the daylight and with time to enjoy the beach.

From a bundled up chilly morning to over 20 Degrees in a matter of hours it can be difficult to figure out how to dress. Dressing in layers is key as is bringing a pack to hold extra clothing as you warm up. We could have pulled off wearing shorts this day, it was a hot one. I loved hiking through the mossy sections on the Henry MacLeod Trail, it was so pretty and had an enchanted feeling to it.

The water running through the Coronet Creek is low in the fall. The trail follows the creek the entire way making it easy to navigate. Unfortunately, hiking into the sun makes it hard to capture the stunning beauty of the area. Never-the-less, I like the effect the sun had on this photo. It adds to the magical feel of the trail.

The Henry MacLeod trail starts just beyond the tent sites at the Coronet Creek Campground. Here we are looking out from the start of the Henry MacLeod Trail towards Maligne Lake and The Hall of Gods on a beautiful and sunny October day in Jasper National Park, Alberta, Canada.

We have already enjoyed four fantastic nights on Maligne Lake so far. However, the magnificent sunrises the lake is known eluded us until this point. This was the spectacular sunrise that we woke up to on Thanksgiving morning. With the canoeing adventure that we had on Maligne Lake, the spectacular scenery and most perfect and peaceful conditions and now this incredible sunrise, how could we not be grateful to be spending Thanksgiving here. If there was a doubt, this made it was worth missing turkey dinner.

Seriously, how does Maligne Lake just keep getting prettier and prettier each day that we are out here? As the sun got higher, the sky changed took on a pink and soft baby blue appearance with the calm waters once again reflecting the colours of the sky back for us. Incredible.

Still early on Thanksgiving morning, Maligne Lake has taken on soft pastel colours making everything feel right in this little part of the world. Here Coronet Creek feeds into the lake showing us the way that we need to go to paddle out of the Hall of the Gods and back to Fisherman's Bay later in the day.

There were 10 other people enjoying Thanksgiving at Coronet Creek on Maligne Lake with us. Here, one couple has begun their journey out. All of our fellow campers were paddling the full 21km from Coronet Creek back to the boat launch this day. These two canoeists and this view reminded me of the famous Jason Carter painting called 'Wild party at Lake Louise' which depicts a variety of wildlife in a red canoe on Lake Louise with its beautiful mountains as a backdrop.

The reflection of the light on the water perfectly illuminates the path we need to paddle to get through the Hall of the Gods on Maligne Lake and back to Fisherman's Bay for our final night on our multi-day canoe trip on Maligne Lake in Jasper over Thanksgiving weekend.