Trip Banff Canada

[anita.gugulski]

Hello All,

I am planning a trip to Banff, Canada for late August and I was hoping to get some advice about the must-see spots and best hikes of a moderate difficulty.

I would also love to learn about less crowded / visited trails that may be overlooked.

Thank you so much for your help!

 

[jholmes01]

Thanks for posing this question Anita. I'm going to be in Banff/Canmore starting on Saturday and have the same questions.

Gillean Daffern's "Kananaskis Country Trail Guide" was highly recommended, so I picked up a copy but haven't had time to dive into it yet. I'll try to post some details/impressions once I'm back, in late July.

 

[angeedraper]

Hello All,

I am planning a trip to Banff, Canada for late August and I was hoping to get some advice about the must-see spots and best hikes of a moderate difficulty.

I would also love to learn about less crowded / visited trails that may be overlooked.

Thank you so much for your help!

When I went 6 years ago, one of my favorite hikes was Sentinel Pass from Moraine Lake. I'm not sure what the logistics are now to park there but the hike was fantastic. Worth the effort (and it was a long hike with elevation). We wanted to add on Eiffel Lake but thunder and lightning rushed us off the mountain. I thought Johnston Canyon was over-rated but at the same time I was glad we stopped so I could say I've done it . We hit it in the afternoon since parking there is also a problem. We hiked down to the shore of Peyto Lake that was in one of my guide books and that was nice to miss some of the crowds. It wasn't a marked trailhead.

 

[canadug]

National Parks in Canada will be the most crowded they have ever been this summer. The government has made it free for all people to enter the parks and friends that have gone said it is a full on zoo of people. Also, for obvious reasons Canadians are boycotting the USA en masse and staying in their own country to vacation so us Canucks are exploring Canada full on. Euros and everyone else are also coming to Canada.

Make sure you have reservations or you will likely be out of luck. The parks are beautiful but will be very very busy!

 

[Janice]

In 2011, we did day hikes in Banff and other national parks in that area and made great use of Kathy & Craig Copeland's book Don't Waste Your Time in the Canadian Rockies: An Opinionated Hiking Guide... Our edition looked different from this one on Amazon. Perhaps it's available from your library, or if you want me to send you photos of the Table of Contents (with the ratings - boots not stars) send me a message separately. There are lots of highly rated hikes in the book, way more than we had time to do, but these are the ones we did. I have no idea how crowded they are now, though:

1) Wilcox Pass in southernmost part of Jasper across from Columbia Icefield - 4 boots - excellent
2) Bow Hut in Banff - 3 boots
3) Iceline in Yoho National Park - 4 boots - excellent
4) Crypt Lake in Waterton - 3 boots - you take a boat to the trailhead, which was cool, but that means everyone is starting together so there are a lot of people
5) Akamina Ridge in Waterton - 4 boots - we only had time for out and back but scenery was great
6) Plain of Six Glaciers at Lake Louise - the book recommends this only during shoulder season due to crowds, but we wanted to take our kids to Lake Louise so we contended with the crowds anyway. Due to a mudslide which had earlier closed the road, we arrived early afternoon and parked really far down the road. At the beginning of the hike, we were with a million people and that was a bummer. But we went past the teahouse and loved that part, and by the time we got back to the teahouse there was almost nobody around and we got to enjoy the way down with no crowds. So if you decide to give Lake Louise a try, consider going very early in the morning or later in the day after the tourbuses hopefully will have left.

We didn't hike Sentinel Pass that @angeedraper recommends, but the book gives it 4 boots.