One of the most striking aspects of the Icefields Parkway, and one that I had not even considered before I was actually standing there on the side of the road, was the silence.

The only other place in which I’ve experienced such total, unbroken silence is in Death Valley. There was no background noise whatsoever. When we turned off the car, it was as though someone had yanked out an audio cable from the universe. It was slightly jarring and really accented the starkness of the sunlit, snow-covered mountains.