Mount Rundle

Banff National Park, Canada

Mount Rundle is a mountain in Canada's Banff National Park overlooking the towns of Banff and Canmore, Alberta. The Cree name was Waskahigan Watchi or house mountain. In 1858 John Palliser renamed the mountain after Reverend Robert Rundle, a Methodist invited by the Hudson's Bay Company to do missionary work in western Canada in the 1840s. He introduced syllabics there—a written language developed for the Cree, as part of his missionary work. He only visited the Stoney-Nakoda of the area around what is now called Mount Rundle in 1844 and 1847. Mt. Rundle could actually be considered a small mountain range as the mountain extends for over 12km, on the south side of the Trans-Canada Highway eastward from Banff to Canmore with seven distinct peaks along the way. The third peak southeast of Banff is the highest at 9675ft. West of the Spray Lakes road is the East End of Rundle— locally known as EEOR—which rises above Whiteman's Gap just south of Canmore. The Rundle Peaks are part of the South Banff Ranges, along with its siblings—the Sundance Range, Sulphur Mountain and the Goat Range.