The mountainous regions of British Colombia and Alberta in Canada are places where the journey truly is as exciting as the destination. Winding through the snowy mountains in a train or cruising in a car up the Icefields Parkway, nature displays one unbelievable panorama after another.
We decide to move from Vancouver to Banff as the leisure class would have a century ago: by train. Our journey into the mountains starts slowly, as our Rocky Mountaineer train creaks through railway yards and over bridges mostly used by freight trains. By one of those spans Bridge Studios looms beside us, the production house that got its start with the TV show MacGyver two decades ago and more recently has been behind Juno and Night at the Museum.
After breakfast the city fades behind us and we spend one day climbing higher to Kamloops, moving along the Fraser River – home to the country’s largest salmon run each year-and along the banks of several lakes.
We watch the fir trees and snowy mountains pass by through the glass-domed roof of the train. The second day of the journey, heading to Banff, is even more dramatic, with climbing switchbacks, spiral tunnels, and a pass over the Continental Divide. We pass Mount Vaux, Mount Cathedral, and Mount Temple, ranging from 10,000 to 12,000 feet high and permanently encrusted with snow and ice.
This far north the Rocky Mountains really are rocky, with few trees managing to find a foothold on the steep banks prone to rockslides, avalanches, and shifting glaciers. The result is a stark contrast of white and gray, light and shadow, each turn of direction presenting another photogenic shot for the whirring cameras.
Banff and the Glacier Lakes
On the train we pass towns that were ghosts of their former selves, booming during the gold rush and railroad build-out, then fading into obscurity over the century since. In destinations where the trains stopped, however, tourism took over as the main economic driver.
Whether arriving in Alberta by train, bus, or car, around three million visitors a year spend at least some time in and around Banff. It is the main town serving Banff National Park and has its own set of attractions: hot springs, a gondola ride, and the Banff Park Museum – a beautiful 1903 wood building filled with stuffed versions of the area’s wildlife. In the days we spend in the area, we run across a few live versions as well while hiking and driving: bears, elk, bighorn sheep, deer, a marmot, and a chipmunk-looking squirrel who treats my camera case as a salt lick.
We spend a few days exploring two postcard-perfect glacial lakes nearby: Lake Moraine and Lake Louise.
The first is more intimate, with one lodge building and a collection of cabins making up Moraine Lake Lodge – a hotel as impressive for its seclusion as its service and food. The more popular Chateau at Lake Louise is a Fairmont hotel that keeps most of its 550 rooms occupied in the peak summer months. Here you can ride a horse halfway around the lake and in both spots you can rent canoes or go hiking, taking in the scenery while glaciers and sharp peaks loom overhead.
Some of the area’s attractions are only open in the warm months, but others keep rolling all year long, including three ski slope facilities.
Along the Icefields Parkway
There are plenty of places around the world that can claim spectacular drives and scenic parkways, but it would be hard for any of them to top the Icefields Parkway between Lake Louise and Jasper. More than 100 glaciers line the sides of the highway, every bend in the road producing another “Wow!” There are scenic stopping points along the way to take in the lakes and waterfalls produced by the melting snow and ice.
About halfway up the parkway is the popular Columbia Icefield, where we board a hulking vehicle with tires that are taller than my 7-year-old daughter. It climbs up the side of a steep mountain and then deposits us on the Athabasca Glacier itself. We stand on ice that is at least 300 feet thick, some of it moving around these parts for at least 10,000 years.
It’s hard not to be moved by the display of nature’s raw power in this region. Some find affirmation of their faith in a higher power, while others are awed by the natural forces constantly reshaping our planet.
Nearly everyone experiences a sense of amazement though and a humility born out of the feeling that this landscape makes the piddling details of our daily work lives seem all that much smaller. If a vacation is meant to give you a different outlook and a break from tired routines, the majesty of the Canadian Rocky Mountains is an ideal prescription.
Tim Leffel is author of the books Make Your Travel Dollars Worth a Fortune and co-author of Traveler’s Tool Kit: Mexico and Central America. He also edits the award-winning narrative Web ‘zine Perceptive Travel.
