Background

This Canada trip was more of an “I’m already in the PNW, why not drive to Canada before going back home” road trip with my dad. The way things worked out, we were in Canada for about a week, then left on Canada Day (July 1). Given the time of the year and multiple national holidays, it was pretty busy in Banff. If you’re going to Banff National Park, you’ll want to plan ahead. Like months ahead. Most of the campsites are reservation only (make sure to get that senior citizen discount if you can), and they fill quickly! We ended up spending the night at two different campgrounds- Lake Louise (we had to pack up on the second day and move to a different tent number as I was only able to find single day reservations at that campground) and Tunnel Mountain Village I (we lucked out on a 2 day open site that was right beside the showers). You will also need National Park passes for each day you are there (If you drive around to the different lake parking lots, someone will be there to check all of your passes, so keep them on your dash/windshield. Despite having to pack up and move multiple times, I’m still glad we got to enjoy the different areas in the order that we did. While part of the beauty of nature is seeing all the wildlife, be sure if you bring your furry family member you keep them close and leashed at all times, so another animal doesn’t try to take off with them.

Lake Louise campground

Given all the warnings about bears and the reasoning for an electric fence around the perimeter of this particular campground, I’m sort of surprised I didn’t see a single one (from a safe distance of course). This campsite has showers and fires are allowed (must buy a permit tho). Our first night we got there pretty late, so it was mostly set up camp before it got dark, then eat and go to sleep.

Moraine Lake

Our first adventure of the morning was driving to Moraine Lake (maybe a couple miles from camp). This was the prettiest lake I’ve ever seen! The water was the bluest teal blue. Because we wanted to see multiple places, we chose to do the short trail that was only like a mile and very flat. It was essentially walking down and back the non mountain side of the lake. After our hike, we went to this cafe in a shopping center right between the lakes and had some elk soup for lunch.

Lake Louise

After refueling, we wanted to go to Lake Louise. They have remote parking and a shuttle that will take you to the actual lake (assuming you aren’t staying at the hotel on the lake or you made it early enough to park at the lake itself), but the shuttle fills very quickly (only seats like 10 or less) and it’s like two vans per hour or something super slow. So after unsuccessfully waiting in line for two shuttles we decided to just walk the 5K to the lake from our campground bc i’m inpatient and we were burning daylight. Once we finally arrive at our destination, we stop for a picture and bathroom break. There are several popular trails you can choose from. We decided to do the one that goes to the tea house and then come back. Once we started our upward journey, I had so many regrets. It was an excruciating non stop steep incline with one or two short flat zones and that’s it. And if you stopped for literally one second to take a break, you would be swarmed by mosquitoes! You had to keep moving in order to avoid being a human buffet. Think those random groups of gnats that sometimes congregate mid air on a sidewalk, I am seriously not even joking about it, it’s like that the entire climb up. I legitimately wanted to quit at least 3 times, but my dad kept pushing me to go on. On the way to the tea house, you’ll come to a nice break at Mirror Lake. There you can see a clear view of Beehive mountain. It is also a crossroads, you can continue on to the tea house (Lake Agnes .5 mile) or do Plain of Six Glaciers (4 miles), obvi, you know which route I wanted to do. Now, I have been crying and aching this entire climb up bc i was hurting, but knowing that i only had 5 mins before Lake Agnes Tea House closed, I found it in me to try my best to run up there so my agony wasn’t for naught. While we just missed normal business hours, they still allowed “to-go” hot drinks and any pastries they had left-over on the shelf for about an hour after closing. It was very unique learning about the story of the tea house, and watching them dip kettles of water from the lake to use inside. The downhill journey back to Lake Louise was a breeze, but I honestly don’t know if I could do that again.

Johnston Canyon

Our next big adventure was Johnston Canyon. Now at this point poor little Dutchess had some constant nasty green eye gunk from allergies or something outdoors, but thankfully my dad had a bottle of eye wash, and after cleaning her eyes with it, she was all better the next morning (we still did it nightly/daily just to be safe the next day or two). She rode in her backpack for this entire trail. Our goal for this hike was getting to the Inkpots (6k from starting point). This trail had a lot more diversity as far as inclines so it was a lot better than Lake Louise. A majority of the hike, you are walking beside a rushing river and waterfalls, so there’s numerous photo ops and break points. The hike gets a little more intense (and less crowded) once you pass Lower Falls & Upper Falls and start going toward the Inkpots. It was really cool seeing the water bubbling up in the bottom of the different tie-dye pools.

Tunnel Mountain Village I

Now it was time to stay at our next campground, Village I. This campground is right outside of this cute little ski town village. There are a lot of gift shops, restaurants, malls, etc. to explore. Here, we decided to drive over to the Cave and its surrounding museum. Once you view the Cave, you can tour around the museum, then go to the rooftop for some good photos. Our next stop was Lake Minnewanka and Two Jacks Lake. Since we had no plans to actually get in the lake, we stopped at some parking off the side of the highway and climbed down a little trail to get to the shore of Minneanka. There is also a brick ledge off the side of the highway where we sat to take a few pics. Then we drove over to the parking lot of the next lake where we sat down in the big red chairs and my dad talked to a fellow forest service employee. Afterwards, we went to the flower garden (don’t remember the name, but it’s right in town) and strolled around. The next day we decided to take it pretty easy and have a picnic by Bow lake and do some gift shopping. We also came back to town for dinner where I tried poutine for the first time.

As our Canada trip came to an end, we geared up for our next camping adventure- Yellowstone National Park!

There’s duplicate pictures on here, just roll with it and enjoy again :)