Canada ~ some travel tips

Tomorrow we will head south of the border – back to the US. We compiled a lit of some “tips”, should you decide to head up this way to Canada. It is by no means complete nor exhaustive, and feel free to post a comment or email us if you have some tips to share.

1) The daily entry fee for Canadian National Parks is expensive – for example, Jasper was $8.90 per person per day – ouch! They do sell a year-long family pass, for about $132 CA. Here’s a big tip – e-bay! The park passes are sold on e-bay for a fraction of their cost, and with a little patience and perseverance, you can save a few bucks. When we came to Canada two years ago, we purchased the annual park pass at the park, for $125 (2006 rate), and sold it on e-bay for $71 when we returned home. This year, we decided to buy our park pass on e-bay, and purchased it for $60.. We actually sold it again for a few bucks when we left the national parks for good! (It expired 9/30/2008, so there was little time remaining.)

2) The National and Provincial Parks provide all the firewood you want – however you need to purchase a “fire permit”. It costs anywhere from $7-10 per day. (In fact, you’re not allowed to bring barked fire wood into Canada - bark beetle issues - so this works well.) If you plan to spend a few days in one park, you can buy a fire permit per day – you do not need to buy one for your entire stay, unless you plan to have a fire everyday.

3) If you’re heading into National Parks try and stock up on as much food as possible in the surrounding towns – we were flabbergasted by the hike in grocery prices in the parks! $6 for a small bag of chips – no kidding!

4) Private campgrounds often charge for additional people over two-adults, including children. No tip here, just be aware.

5) If you’re staying near the Canadian/US border, ask locals about going over the border to get gas (and beer). We saved about $30/tank when staying in Creston, and – no kidding – about the same for a 12-pack of beer. (In Jasper, Brad found a 12-pack of, what he would call “bad beer”, for $42. He hasn’t stopped talking about it since!)

6) Speaking of gas, if you are hunting for low gas prices, we found that Save-On Foods and Extra Foods have “gas bars”, where after you fill your tank, you get 5.5% of the amount you spent on gas as a coupon to use in their stores. They seemed to have the lowest gas prices in the areas we visited, and their food stores were large, clean, stocked and reasonably priced.

Baker Creek Bistro, Lake Louise in Banff, Canadad

After canoeing in Lake Moraine, we had our (last recommended) lunch in Lake Louise at Baker Creek Bistro. The lodge was nice, and had a small dining room. Brad had a bison pastrami with brie sandwich which he liked very much, but Suzanne’s macaroni & cheese was rather bland (we actually find the cheese in Canada to be bland). The service was just okay; out of all our meals at Lake Louise, this was our least favorite.

Chateau Lake Louise & High Tea, Lake Louise in Banff, Canada

The Chateau Lake Louise is very nice and on Lake Louise itself. It has great service in all areas, the employees are polite, helpful, respectful – Suzanne is a good-service hound and loved it. They have many (expensive) restaurants, services, tours, can exchange money at front desk – great rate and no fee (better than the ATM in Ft. McLeod where we got Canadian money). There is valet parking for $15, but you can park on own in “government” lots for free. Be sure to get there early in day (before 10am) or after (after 4pm) or parking is a hassle. They even have a “lobby dog” named Sonny who is a seeing-eye dog “drop out” (he was afraid of cars) who hangs by the tour desk (to the left of the reception desk). He was quite sweet & mellow – you can even take him for a walk!

While at the Chateau, we had High Tea in the Fairmont dining room, which is lovely. There was great service and it was a great meal since we took tea at 4pm, and it replaced dinner for that evening. After starting with Champagne, there was fruit cocktail with contrineau, great scones with Devonshire cream & strawberry jam, a variety of four tea sandwiches: salmon rolls, tomatoes on crisonti, cheese, egg salad w/ cucumbers (I’m not doing these justice with these descriptions) and five desserts - small chocolate Mousse, apple flan, citrus meringue, pistachio tartlet with strawberry (filled with cream), a flourless orange cake, and of course, tea.

TIP – If it is sunny, do not sit by windows as if can be very, very hot (the dining room gets direct sun in the afternoon). If you go there for dinner, it is recommended you dine after 7pm, when the dining room cools.

Bow Falls Hike, Lake Louise at Banff, Canada

Bow Falls hike is a very nice, about 3 hours in length. It starts with a lovely walk around Bow Lake towards the head of the lake, where you follow rushing water the entire way. You go over two small hills, then a bigger hill where can see canyon. There it forks - you can go left (over boulder suspending over canyon) to the Bow Hut, or right (what we did) to the Falls. The trail is a bit difficult to follow to the falls, so be sure follow cairns.

Tip – start this hike early in the in day since the water levels rise on sunny days and it makes getting back somewhat potentially difficult (unless you don’t mind taking off your shoes and wading through glacially-cold water…..).

Parker Ridge Trail, Banff National Park, Canada

Parker Ridge (trailhead 4 km south of the Icefields Centre) Trail is a very steep hike, but more than well worth the effort – it has some fabulous views! You hike behind the Columbia Icefields to spectacular Saskachawan glacier (not seen form the road) with its small lake (unfortunately, it was a cloudy day and our pictures do not do it justice). Be sure to walk to the left as well for more views. It’s about 3 hours with lots of time at top, which can be cool & breezy.

Eiffel Lake hike, Lake Louise at Banff, Canada

We hiked to Eiffel Lake today, a trail that boasts of 10 peaks, in fact, those peaks are found on the back of some Canadian $20 bills. The trailhead is at Moraine Lake, where except for the short trail part-way up the lake, all trails are in grizzly country. Thus, there is a rule that you need to be hiked in a tight group of 4 or more people. If you are smaller than a group of 4 (like us), you can wait at the trailhead and join others. We joined a couple for the first leg who were very nice, and then at the split between Eiffel Lake & Larch Valley/Sentinal Pass, they went onto the latter hike, so we waited about 20 minutes & joined another group heading our direction to Eiffel Lake. The trail is quite steep in beginning with many switchbacks, all in trees but once at the point where the trail forks, it is open and flat. The people we hiked to Eiffel Lake went on, but we hung out for a while and started back on our own until another group came by, and one of their members joined us for the hike back to the trailhead.

Lake Louise Station, Lake Louise in Banff, Canada

Again, on a recommendation, we ate lunch at Lake Louise Station, a restaurant made from the original railroad station at Lake Louise (in fact, a train went by while we ate lunch). It was very nice and very casual – the meals are well-proportioned, you can easily share, or take half home for another time. There are also train cars where dinner is served – also recommended and looked great, but we never made it there for dinner.

Plain of Six Glaciers, Lake Louise at Banff, Canada

The Plain of Six Glaciers hike starts at the Lake Louise lodge and follows the lake to the end. This part of the trail is hard packed, level, and popular. At the end of the lake the trail starts the climb up through a series of switchbacks to reach the teahouse. The trail at times contains a lot of loose rock and has jagged rock to step over and around, so definitely wear sturdy shoes. The entire hike is mostly in the open, and has amazing views of glaciers along the way - we even heard and saw glacier ice/snow breaking free many times while on the hike. The teahouse is a preserved hiking chalet and is now used to reward hikers on making that far with a good assortment of teas and many good treats, like their homemade chocolate cake, scones and apple pie, to mention a few. The teahouse is open to views, so it’s a wonderful experience to have a nice cup of tea while having these amazing views.

If you have the energy, then definitely continue to the Plain of Six Glacier Overlook. This is a continuation of the main trail that take you about mile closer to the glaciers, plus gets you full view of more glaciers and the Abbott Hut perched on top ( not viewable from the teahouse). The trail is completely open, and most the time you are hiking up and across huge piles of loose rocks deposited decades ago. At this end of this trail you are at the end of the canyon and have great views of the entire Lake Louis valley (down onto the lake) as well as the mountains behind the lodge area that you can’t see from the lodge. From this perspective you also can see the that loose rock that covers the valley floor is actually rock and dirt covering a glacier.

Tips: the teahouse only takes cash, go early and be on the trail by 9-10 to beat the heat and crowds. Wear sturdy shoes for there is a lot of loose and big rocks on the trail.

Johnston Canyon Hike and Storm Mountain Lodge, Banff National Park, Canada

We got a late start today, and the weather wasn’t great for a long, view hike, so we did the Johnston Canyon Hike - along with everyone else! Definitely start early in day – it’s a very busy hike and paved nearly the entire way. You can hike to lower falls which are nice, then onto the upper falls, which are nice as well. It’s about 1-2 hours for entire hike (we did it in 1 ½ hours). There are some really great views and we recommend the hike, but watch the crowds. The best parking is not in the main lot, but by the restaurant/bathrooms.

Not too far form the Johnston Canyon area is Storm Mountain Lodge where it was recommended we have lunch. It is a 1922’s out-of-the-way lodge – adorable, quaint, great food – lovely log cabin with a great waiter – we definitely recommend to go for lunch or dinner. It had a simple menu and great dessert. (We highly recommend the peach cobbler!!)

(We saw this Osprey & nest nest on the bridge to Johnston Canyon.)

Lake Louise at Banff National Park, Alberta, Canada

The Lake Louise area of Banff National Park has a small townsite (not really much of one) and two campgrounds – one for tents that’s in an electric fence and one for trailers. Some trailer sites are shared sites, which is two trailers park side-by-side, but each “site” still has its own area with a picnic table and electric. There were good hot showers and washrooms. They also offer nightly ranger talks in the tent area of the campground. You can hear the train – day and night, but it isn’t too loud. We stayed here for 9 nights.