SOIL SURVEY

PARTIGENERAL DESCRIPTION OF THE AREALOCATION AND EXTEN TYoho National Park is located in southeastern British Columbia (Figure 1) .The Park is shaped roughly like a diamond with its northernmost point at approximately51° 48 ' N . latitude, its most easterly point at approximately 116° 15 ' W . longitude ,its southernmost point at approximately 50° 57 ~ N . latitude and its most westerly poin tat approximately 116° 49 ~ W . longitude . The northeastern Park boundary is situate don the Continental Divide coincident with the British Columbia - Alberta border .Yoho National Park is bounded on the Alberta side of the border by Banff Nationa lPark, and to the southeast, Yoho National Park is bounded by Kootenay Nationa lPark along a portion of its border .The area of the Yoho National Park is about 507 square miles . It is abou t22 miles wide at its widest east-west dimension and about 35 miles at its longestnorth-south dimension .HISTORY, DEVELOPMENT, AND PRESENT CULTURAL FEATURE SAmong the first known "visitors" to the area which is now known as Yoh oNational Park were the Kootenai Indians from interior British Columbia and the Cre eand Stony Indians from the plains of Alberta . A thorough review of the history o fYoho National Park was prepared by Getty (1972) . Archaeological evidence indicatesthat the Kootenai Indians used the Ottertail and Amiskwi valleys when travellingto Howse Pass to meet the Plains Indians for trading purposes . Yoho is the Cree wordfor wonder or astonishment while the spectacular Takakkaw falls in the Yoho valle yis named after the Stony word for "it is wonderful" .In 1807, David Thompson travelled down the Blaeberry River to the Columbi aRiver where he established several trading posts . There is however, no word o fThompson leaving his route to explore the Amiskwi or Kicking Horse River valleys .