The fourteen people gathered in a cool room at the Jasper Museum and Archives are in for it now. Their morning has been spent running over the highlights of the natural history of the Rocky Mountains, and now, sated from their lunch break, the would be interpreters are getting ready to digest something a little more substantial than a soup and sandwich combo. It’s time for the history of Parks Canada.

Gripping stuff? Perhaps not, but such is the background necessary to take on the role of guide, tour operator or interpreter in Jasper. As the tourist hordes gather their strength for the annual summertime invasion, locals, both long-time and newly-arrived, are making preparations of their own. One of the more significant steps that some take is to sit through a course offered by the Mountain Parks Heritage Interpretation Association (MPHIA).

Formed in 1997 and intended to provide a basic standard of interpretation training throughout the mountain national parks, the MPHIA qualification has become the first stage on the standard path to becoming a fully fledged guide. For others, it’s all the training they require to fill their roles in serving the visitors that come to see what the fuss is about in the Rockies.

Some might think of guides as those rugged group leaders, dressed in fleece and Gore-Tex finery, leading groups of hikers or mountaineers to new and glorious heights. That’s true, but the role of the interpreter in a place like Jasper is no less important, and as the cross-section of course attendees proves, the people who fill that role have no mould to follow.

Take Don, a resident of Jasper for 32 years. 

“I thought I knew the park, until I had visitors from the UK and they started asking questions. I found I didn’t know as much as I thought,”  he tells the class. He’s not going to be leading an expedition to Mount Robson anytime soon, but if he’s stopped on the street by an inquisitive visitor, he’ll be that much better prepared to take the question.

On the other hand, there are those like Yasu, a young Japanese tour guide who will be starting a job in Banff before the month is done. With his translation device working overtime, Yasu has come to the MPHIA course to gain important knowledge about the area he’ll be working in.

By the time the two days are out, Don, Yasu and the rest of the students will have not only heard about ecosystems and glacier formation, but they will have been introduced to the basics of interpretation and given a chance to show off their skills.

For anyone, let alone someone operating in a second language, the second day of the MPHIA standard course can be a bit intimidating. After hearing about the importance of prior research and sticking to a unifying theme, the instructor throws a curveball at the class. Pick up an object from a box and do a bit of extemporaneous interpretation on it. It might seem like an abstract exercise, but it in effect mirrors the experience of any tour guide or front line staffer when a visitor questions them about the colour of Lake Annette or the formation of Pyramid Mountain. While touring around Jasper and area, you’ll probably be able to separate those who’ve gone through the MPHIA course or similar training and the people who haven’t. The trained ones will be saying something about rockflour and sediment, while those not in know might simply blanch and point you in the direction of the Information Centre or the nearest “Hanbook of the Canadian Rockies”.

As a visitor, these resources can provide most of what you’d be looking for in the way of answers, but you can’t question the value of what MPHIA provides: informed locals who can refer to their own personal experiences as they relate to the matter. After all, it might be fascinating to read a passage on porcupine mating habits, but it’s far more entertaining to hear that same information from someone who can then relate the sorry tale of when his dog was a first-hand witness to it.