Today was the last day of #D&KCanada150 … Alberta edition. We started the day with breakfast from Rocky Mountain Bagel Co. When doing our research, we came across Rocky Mountain Soap Company and thought we need to visit that store. We then learned that they offer a workshop tour ($25 CAD / person) and we decided we definitely had to do that.
While we were waiting for our tour guide, we noticed how great the parking lot smelled. After a few minutes, Sue arrived and she got the tour started by showing us where they make the soap bars. We learned that it takes about four to six weeks for the soap to dry and that they use all natural products or essential oils in all of their products. For example, we saw a large vat of olive oil from Italy. The thing that surprised me the most is that it only takes fifteen people to produce all of their products by hand. They even contract out the wrapping of the small hotel soap bars to people in the community.
Rocky Mountain Soap Company tries to do things as simply as possible with as much reuse/recycling as possible. For example, a hot dog cart is used to dispense body butters into the containers, a cement mixer is used to make the salt scrubs and a juicer helps the chemists come up with new formulas.
We were allowed to see practically every area of the company from production to packaging to inventory control to shipping (where the shipping peanuts are edible) to new product development to administration. It was a fascinating tour which ended with us making our own bath salts.
Since it was such a sunny day, we picked up lunch from Rocky Mountain Flatbread which we enjoyed on our deck. With our $20 coupon from the tour, we headed over to downtown Canmore to do some final shopping. We went back and took the car up to the Canmore Nordic Centre where we watched people practising shooting for the biathlon.
The last thing that we have planned for our trip was a rafting tour. Karen found that there were companies that offer gentle rafting. What they means is that we sit in the boat and somebody else does all of the work. Karen’s research lead us to Canmore Raft Tours which offered a tour called The Explorer ($60 CAD / person). What is great about this tour is that it is longer (two and a half hours) versus the one hour Townie Tour. We walked over to the boat launch area and were greeted by Steph and Chris (the owner). They told us that it was only going to be Karen and I so basically we had a private tour which would normally cost $480 CAD. Yippee.
Chris, Karen and I spent the next two and a half hours floating down the Bow River. Chris was able to take us into some coves that normally he would not be able to because of the number of people in the raft. We saw a mama elk and her baby and we even saw a beaver. That was not on the list of wildlife we thought we would see. It was so peaceful on the river and the views were just stunning. And we even had hot beverages and snacks (sausage, cheese and crackers).
It was so awesome having the owner of the company be our guide. Chris told us a lot of information about life in Canmore and his rafting stories were even better. The best story he told us was about the time that on one of their overnight rafting trip, a bear got into their barrel of food. Chris and his crew had to go and find any remaining food but what they did end up finding was that the bear had puked up the red wine and gummy bears that he ate. The tour ended with Steph picking us up where Highway 1 crosses the Bow River. Afterwards, we got dropped off in downtown Canmore with a list of restaurant recommendations.
For our last meal in Canmore, we went to Crazy Weed and Chris was right, this was a good restaurant. After dinner, it was back to the condo to pack. Tomorrow we go home.
Hi.. Dorothy. The way you had described about the trip and pictures are simply wonderful and mind blowing. Feeling the beauty of nature, just looking into these pictures. Great.