Banff and Jasper: Our RV Road Trip
We decided to take “vanlife” across the globe and rent an RV during our trip to The Rockies in Canada.
We had seen a lot of pictures and videos displaying just how beautiful British Columbia and Alberta are, and we wanted to explore as much as we could while we were in the area. It was actually my sister’s idea, when we were contemplating what kind of car to rent… and it was such an obvious solution! Hotels are expensive, we live in a van in the UK anyway, I love driving, and we needed a vehicle to get around… so why not?!
Like a lot of tourists in this region of Canada, we kicked things off in the magical town of Banff. We had previously spent a week with our friends who live in Revelstoke, and did some fun off-the-beaten-path/non-touristy stuff with them, so it was quite a different vibe being in such a tourist hotspot! We arrived in the late afternoon, after driving from the rental place in Calgary, so it was time to hit up some of the taprooms our friends had recommended, and calm my nerves down from the first time driving (and parking!) our new friend “Archie” the RV.
Once I’d calmed down from both the drive and the sensory nightmare of thousands of tourists walking at snails-pace in the streets and stopping dead in their tracks to take photos of what seemed like absolutely nothing, we perched up on a couple of stools at the window in Sheepdog Brewing for a refreshing pint and some people watching. We really loved it in that taproom. It had some good music on, the bartender was friendly and knowledgeable about the beers on offer, and there was just a lovely chilled out vibe in the place. It was exactly our kind of place - good beers, the people in there were probably late 20s - early 50s and everyone seemed to have the same outdoorsy energy, as if they’d been out all day hiking or cycling, etc. then came to the same bar to enjoy a couple of pints of good quality beer together and exchange stories of their days.
On the subject of outdoor activities, we spent our one and only full day in Banff renting an e-Bike and cycling the famous Bow Valley Parkway to Jasper Canyon and back. It was probably my favourite day of the whole trip! I’d read about the scenic road that is the Bow Valley Parkway, and was really excited to drive it… However, it is closed to cars every September to allow cyclists to enjoy the ancient road, and that’s exactly what we did! I can’t even begin to describe how incredible the scenery was, and to see it from a bike without the constraints of the van roof was extra special. The mountains absolutely dwarf you as you cycle the 25km route, passing the most beautiful lakes and rivers, and if you’re lucky, catching some glimpses of the local wildlife.
During our ride, we saw a few chipmunks and some mule deer - aptly named due to their donkey-like big ears. No bears or moose this time!
Following our day in Banff, we decided it would be wise to head north towards Jasper, but stop off along the way and take in more of the wild scenery with a bit of hiking in the mix, too. We did consider Lake Louise, but as we’d already seen some stunning lakes, and were about to see more during our road trip to Jasper, we felt it wouldn’t be worth the hassle of competing with the other tourists for “that perfect Instagram shot”... not to mention parking our beast in the packed out car parks!
Once you get off Highway 1, and enter the Icefields Parkway, you’re immediately transported into a holiday brochure and you see everything you ever imagined Canada would look like. The rest had been stunning up until this point, but the Icefields Parkway road stepped it up to another level. The turquoise water meandering down the Saskatchewan River, the giant mountains at either side of you, the bikers cruising along the wide open roads, the huge trucks making you shit yourself every time they overtake you… the whole lot… and then, A BEAR!!! A literal black bear just chilling at the side of the road watching all the traffic go by. Annoyingly, I was driving so couldn’t get a good look at it, but Tora saw it in all its glory after screaming “BEAR” at me as it poked its head out the forest. Naturally, I wanted to slam the brakes on and give it a big cuddle, but I resisted.
We were spoilt for choice when it came to choosing a hike, but we went with the Bow Summit and Lake Peyto trail. Lake Peyto has two famous characteristics: its shape resembles a wolf, and the colour that is absolutely insane. The lake gets its colour from a substance known as “rock flour”. Rock flour is the ground rock that is created by the movement of the glacier, then the melted snow and ice from the glacier carry it into the lake. This rock flour doesn’t sink, and therefore stays on top of the water. The particles of rock flour absorb the blue wavelengths of the colour spectrum, and that is what is reflected into your eyes.
Lake Peyto wasn’t the only attraction here. We hiked up through the forest and ended the trail looking down over Bow Lake. The top section of the hike was pure rock - it felt like we were on Mars! To be honest, the hike itself wasn’t overly fun. We enjoyed the views, but there were just long stretches of nothingness, which made the uphill sections feel like a bit of a slog. It was also very windy that day, and there was a chill in the air, which didn’t help the motivation levels. Nevertheless, we reached the top and enjoyed a well-earned sandwich looking down at the Icefields Parkway road that we’d soon be hitting again. Seeing everyone driving along the Ice Fields Parkway got us excited for the road ahead, and with that, we headed back down the mountain.
We continued on for a little while, with a park-up in mind - right by the Icefields Skywalk, with the intention of doing that in the morning. When we arrived, around an hour later, we were met by what looked like the RV Rental place all over again! So many rental RVs! How great to be surrounded by other people in the exact same position as us, at that exact same time. All having driven the famous road, and arrived in the same spot to bed down for the night, with excitement in the air about what tomorrow would bring. That wasn’t the only thing we were met with. We were surrounded by great big glacial mountains and more gorgeous scenery to soak up.
We settled in for the night, cracked open a can of beer that we’d bought from one of the taprooms back in Banff, and enjoyed a night in the RV playing cards, cooking dinner and having a grand old laugh together. It was a truly magical evening - exactly what life on the road is all about.
After doing some minor research about the Icefields Skywalk vs what else there was to do, we decided it was a bit too touristy for our liking - selling the idea of going up 200m to see the views that surrounded us - but after hiking up the mountain that day, and knowing there’d be more to come, we thought it’d be best to just head straight to Jasper and jump in a canoe, where we could take in the scenery in a more natural way.
The drive the next morning felt even more exhilarating. It just felt truly wild - out in the wilderness - “just me, you and the OPEN ROAD, BABY!!” Tora booked us a canoe to hire on Maligne Lake, just under an hour outside of Jasper, so after a pit-stop in Jasper itself for some much needed fuel, we headed to the lake. It’s worth noting here that the Icefields Parkway only has one gas station (petrol station, to us) - and that’s at the Saskatchewan River Crossing. To put into context, the last gas station before you get onto the Icefields Parkway is in Lake Louise, which is around 80km from the Saskatchewan River Crossing, and after that… well, you’re in for an uneasy 153km drive to Jasper if you’re running low on fuel! Thankfully, I’m a bit of an over-planner when it comes to fuel, so as soon as that needle hits the ¼ tank mark, I’m looking for the next station to get topped up at, we were fine. I can imagine other people from the UK, or other parts of the world where you’ve got petrol stations pretty much every 10 - 15 miles along the main roads to potentially take it for granted that this will be the case here. It is not.
We were warned that Jasper had faced a terrible wildfire in 2024, and that many parts hadn’t recovered, but we were not prepared for the sheer amount of burnt forest all the way to Maligne Lake! The remains of the trees looked like pure charcoal pencils, and the wildlife was scarce. It was devastating, actually. There were signs for attractions along the way, and campsites, but a lot of them had “closed” written over them. I’ll come back to the fire later, as we met a local later on who had fallen victim to it.
Arriving at Maligne Lake on what can only be described as the windiest day of the year so far, we were late for our rental and there was nowhere to park - bloody tourists! We drove around and around the car park, then we spotted a sign for another car park a little further away. Knowing tourists don’t seem to like walking, and always want to be parked right in the thick of it, we made a dash for the exit. Of course, loads of spots! We leapt out the van and hot-footed it to the lake. Needless to say, on such a windy day, canoes weren’t exactly in short supply.
We were met by another idiotic couple who’d decided this activity sounded ace on a day like that, and a Northern-English lad who checked us in. He enlightened us that the water temperature was a chilly -3°C, and advised us to get out as soon as we could, should we fall in… I was planning on having a cheeky bathe if I fell in, but hey-ho! The lake is glacial-fed, so the water temperature rarely gets above 0°C. He checked that we’d been in a canoe before and with that, flung some life vests at us, told us to get in and if we got into difficulty to “wave your hands and someone will see you; we’ve got loads of people around the lake”.
Feeling confident, we plopped ourselves into the canoe and set off rowing into the horizon. The other two went off ahead of us and started bombing it for the other side of the lake, right in the path of the cruise boats that were coming and going! We chose the lower-risk option of clinging to the edges like a pair of pensioners on an ice rink, but there is no way I was risking falling into that icy water. The views really were spectacular from the lake, and we even saw more deer as we paddled around trying to get the hang of rowing in tandem. We basically laughed at ourselves for the duration of our paddle, then it was time to get out and head to the campsite - we were even greeted by some mountain goats on the road as we meandered our way there!
The campsite was absolutely massive! It felt like there was nobody but also loads of people at the same time… It was just so spread out. Sadly, there were a lot of black, crispy tree remains following the fire, but thankfully other trees had survived and you could see that more had been planted. We were warned to watch out for bears and elk, and not to approach them if they come near. This excited us greatly and we were eager to spot either one of these Canadian beasts (from the safety of our RV, of course!). Sadly, we didn’t see any bears, but we did see a small family of young elk in the morning! They were just happily grazing on the trees around us; two females and a male.
Once all the elk-sitement (not sorry) was all over with, we grabbed the bus into town and set about our day in Jasper itself. We did a spot of shopping - got a couple of card games, some nice Jasper-based clothing and a bumbag - or fanny-pack as I think they say over there… It wasn’t long before we fell into a bar, and inevitably sat there for the remainder of the day playing our newly purchased games. Jasper was smaller than I imagined. I think a lot of the shops have had to close down due to the fire, but regardless, I think I imagined the town itself to be about the same size as Banff but it was a lot smaller. We were there just outside of tourist-season, too, so it felt a lot quieter as well… which I prefer.
Waiting for the bus back, we got chatting to a local man, Joe, who was directly impacted by the fire. His house was completely burnt down and he has had to move into his friend’s caravan at a local campsite. He understandably expressed such disappointment in the government, and their lack of urgency to get residents back into homes in the town. He said that only “essential workers” were rehomed quickly, whereas the rest were kind of just left to it. He works in the hospitality industry, and has done in the same town for almost 30 years - he said he’d made the town millions of dollars through his lifetime of service, but now, he’s left to live in a caravan out of town and has to fund his own way to and from his place of work. Despite all this, he still felt grateful to have a friend who had a caravan for him to live in otherwise he’d be homeless.
After a few days in Jasper, it was sadly time to make our way back towards Calgary for the flight home. We stopped off for the night in Canmore to break up the drive. Canmore is another touristy town but has a nice vibe to it, and there’s plenty of food and drink options. We arrived late-afternoon and we were ravenous, so we went out for our final meal at an Indian restaurant and got ourselves an early night for the long trip home ahead of us.
Before dropping off the RV, we had to do all the not-so-glamerous jobs like emptying the loo, grey water and filling up the fresh water tanks. We dropped into Lake Louise campsite for this, who allowed us to use the facilities free of charge. The rental company said we had to make sure this was done otherwise there’d be a charge. We had already emptied the loo at the campsite we stayed at in Jasper, but the digital dial that tells you how full your tank is, wasn’t showing 0% so we went to this one to double-check. The only problem is, the rental company had only provided us with one pair of rubber gloves that I’d already used and disposed of!! Being the industrious individual I am, I slipped an old carrier bag onto my right hand and off I went. Told you it wasn’t glamorous! Our final task was to fill the tank up with petrol and head back to the rental company for inspection.
The inspection went fairly smoothly. I did make a blunder, though, and I’d actually booked the RV for one extra day, knowing our flight wasn’t until late in the evening, so I thought we could have more time - however, when it came to returning it, I completely forgot about that excellent idea and turned up at 11am sharp for the return! Never mind. We had also gone a whopping 30 miles over the 500 mile limit, so we were charged a grand total of £1.75 for this.
Meeting us at the drop-off point was Julie; a lady I’d met during my solo trip to Vietnam back in 2019! Her and her husband Mac, who I also met in Vietnam, actually live out in Calgary! Knowing we were going to have a whole afternoon free before our flight, I reached out to Julie and asked if she and Mac would like to meet up, to which they did! It was so great to see them again after 6 years of following each other’s adventures on social media from the other side of the world. Julie took me and Tora to a really cute little farmer’s market before we headed back to their place for a beer while we waited for Mac finishing work. It wasn’t long before Mac joined us, had a little catch up then headed out for pizza at a new restaurant they’d wanted to try. I’m so pleased we actually got to see them, and Tora got to meet them for the first time. They’re a truly lovely couple, and I hope we don't leave it so long next time.
With that, our trip came to an end and the two of them dropped us off at Calgary Airport. It was an immense adventure.
