My children — two boys, 3 and 5 — love “magic water paint” books. For the uninitiated, the pages of those books are pre-loaded with a lightweight layer of pigment, indistinguishable from the clean web page till swept with a moist brush. Simply add water and the pages gentle up with coloration, whereas children (and possibly some much less formidable adults) enjoy a tiny little bit of discovery.
I’ve rapid magic water paint deja vu as I maintain my iPhone as much as the moonlight sky on a bridge over the Vermillion River in Canada’s Kootenay Nationwide Park. To my eyes (poor gentle receptors relative to a contemporary digital camera lens), house is crammed with star factors and what seems to be a wash of milky white clouds. However to the lens on my telephone’s digital camera or, higher but, the telephoto connected to my Canon, the night time sky is freaking out.
I’ve joined Lexus within the Canadian Rockies, proper alongside the continental divide, to drive the brand new GX 550 and discover some wild, darkish locations. The ostensible level of the journey is to go to throughout the peak season for northern lights when charged particles thrown off by the solar slam into the Earth’s ionosphere and make a fairly mess. Different actions embrace leaping right into a glacier-fed lake earlier than breakfast, mountaineering, biking, sliding vehicles round within the gravel, and glamorously schlepping my muddy gear from spot to identify in a Lexus. What a world.
Full Disclosure: Lexus flew me to Calgary, Alberta, and put me up in a few good accommodations with mountain views for the higher a part of per week. I acquired to drive the GX 550 all around the Rockies in Alberta and British Columbia, whereas stopping to eat, hike, and take footage of the night time sky.
In nearly each respect the brand new GX is a dual-threat automobile excellent for our week’s prescribed mixture of freeway driving and off-road-ish recreation. As you’ve perhaps already learn in Rory’s essay concerning the new GX 550 vs. his sadly departed GX 470 or Daniel’s almost-glowing first drive evaluation, the brand new Lexus truck is excellent. That is my second go behind the wheel of the GX, and after clocking a whole lot of kilometers over 5 days of driving I can verify solely two reservations concerning the SUV:
- Over about 60 miles per hour the hood flexes in a approach that makes me a bit sad. Bizarre, proper? However I drove three totally different GX on the freeway this week — two Overtrail fashions and one within the Luxurious trim — and all demonstrated the identical flexing hood when driving on the freeway. I’m not satisfied the wobbly hood means something is flawed, to be clear, nevertheless it’s definitely not a marker of the type of bulletproof high quality that earlier Toyota and Lexus off-roaders have loved.
- The bottom value of the GX 550 is $64,250 together with vacation spot, or a bounce of about $4,000 from the previous-generation GX 460. Issues are costlier now, I get it. And the one solution to get a few of what the GX is providing in a brand new automobile with related functionality at a considerably cheaper price could be to discover a base mannequin Land Rover Defender. The Landie goes for round $60K in turbo four-cylinder guise, and it clearly has a a lot dicier status for long-term reliability. How does anybody afford something today, good god.
Ignoring the hood and the sticker shock, I discover the GX 550 an absolute peach to drive. Canadian limits appear nearly painfully sluggish, however I get pleasure from frequent forays into super-legal speeds due to the punchy twin-turbocharged 3.4-liter V6. With 349 horsepower and 479 pound-feet of torque obtainable, passing pulls from 60 mph to 80-plus are a breeze and I wrestle to not rip by means of the politely obedient Albertan commuters.
Threats from the Royal Mounted Police (and the Alberta Sheriff Freeway Patrol, because the Mounties don’t do Alberta for some purpose) to the facet, it’s the proper place to knock round and discover with an enormous SUV. This space of Western Canada is residence to Banff, Jasper, Yoho and the aforementioned Kootenay nationwide parks, with a number of the most picturesque landscapes I’ve seen in 20 years of touring. From the early fall by means of the spring, it’s additionally a fantastic place to go to take a look at the sky with a minimal of sunshine air pollution.
The objective of this journey is to catch a glimpse of the aurora, and Lexus has deliberate for an extra-long four-night journey to enhance our odds of seeing the northern lights. Because it turned out, the journey may have been an prolonged overnighter, because the photo voltaic radiation drifts in our path on the very first night out.
To observe exercise, scientists and photographers depend on a measure of house climate circumstances referred to as the Planetary Ok-Index. Right here I’m going to need to quote immediately from the Nationwide Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to (kinda, half-assed) clarify what the index measures:
The Ok-index quantifies disturbances within the horizontal part of earth’s magnetic discipline with an integer within the vary 0-9 with 1 being calm and 5 or extra indicating a geomagnetic storm.
Obtained it? Me both. However the gist is that, when on the lookout for northern lights, the upper the Kp quantity the higher.
We shortened our welcome dinner after arriving at Lake Louise on the primary night time in Canada as a result of the native guides/photographers noticed Kp numbers leaping off the dimensions. I’m, at coronary heart, a complete nerd, so it was straightforward to get swept up within the pleasure across the chase regardless of jetlag and my common desire to finish a press dinner with bourbons.
Arriving at Kootenay simply after nightfall, I’m shocked at first to seek out this “darkish sky” space of the world isn’t all that darkish. Because it seems I’m visiting on the nexus of two uncommon astronomical phenomena: the very excessive Kp index plus a massively vivid “tremendous moon.” At the same time as our final experiences point out a Kp worth of seven and even greater, with 9 being the higher restrict, it’s clear that the extraordinary moonlight will make seeing aurora with the bare eye considerably difficult.
For a lot of the night time I’m squinting by means of a viewfinder on the magic present unfolding above, totally agog with the small feeling people get from trying on the sky too lengthy. Standing on a footbridge above the Vermillion River, our group is about as quiet as a dozen individuals may be. The silence is damaged solely sometimes with whispered directions on learn how to pull give attention to a faraway star to raised resolve your night time sky photograph, or a muffled “whoop” when somebody catches a unique approach on the coronet of white, purple, pink, and inexperienced lights in a dome over our heads. It’s the kind of factor the place you want everybody you’re keen on have been there with you to see what you’re seeing.
That seems to be the theme of the week, as we repeatedly get up early and keep up late to do fantastic shit out in unbelievably stunning bits of nature. I jumped within the 46-degree glacier-fed waters of Lake Louise (can’t advocate the expertise however I can say you’ll get numerous consideration strolling again to your lodge room drenched and in slippers). I took an unbelievable e-bike journey to Moraine Lake the place I hiked round and took my selfie subsequent to the a whole lot of different beauty-drunk vacationers taking their selfies. I acquired sprayed with mist at Wapta Falls and noticed bear scat subsequent to the river, the place I collected cool rocks to carry again to the youngsters.
As a solution to get round this a part of the Earth, the GX 550 is good. Even when you don’t do a day tramping by means of mud and principally dried floodplains within the Ghost River Valley, as I did on the ultimate day, the mixture of house, lodging and all-terrain potential simply makes adventuring straightforward. I like a truck that rides and handles like a luxurious automobile however nonetheless isn’t so treasured that I’m afraid to step in with muddy boots or toss moist baggage within the again. All of that’s within the GX’s candy spot.
On that entrance, I’ve one other fast, very particular driving impression: I spent essentially the most time behind the wheel of a GX 550 outfitted with an non-obligatory $1,580 Lexus Roof Rack and a Kammok Crosswing retractable awning. The Kammok unit is tremendous straightforward to make use of, however I used to be extra impressed with how little wind noise the rack-plus-awning setup generated when driving. Clearly some good aero work is at play right here along with glorious noise isolation within the cabin. If you happen to wish to journey with stuff in your roof, take be aware.
There’s a steep hill within the Ghost River Valley space, clearly utilized by locals with 4x4s and grime bikes, that necessitated my placing the GX in low vary for the one time on the journey to Canada. The Lexus clambered up the hill —completely left of the proper line I later came upon — with a joyful ease. Off the crushed path or throughout the useless of winter, that is an space of the world the place having a real four-wheeler isn’t a nasty concept.
After all, on the finish of September with principally gentle climate and clear roads, I may’ve replicated most of Rockies journey in nearly any automobile with just a few inches of floor clearance. The purpose of the GX, and the rationale it’s really easy to advocate regardless of its bounce up in value, is that it’s so pleasing to drive even when you don’t have a thought in your head about going off the pavement. However that added functionality, various it in truth, offers a tremendous confidence enhance for pushing your adventures farther and additional.
I say this each time I journey however this time I imply it: I’m coming again to Banff. Leuxs or no, I need to carry my household to take a plunge in a lake, hike a number of the greater trails, and sit quietly trying on the sky because the solar goes down. There’s some wild magic on this place value sharing.
