In March we started planning our Silver Wedding Anniversary holiday, although we had been talking about it for a while. Where should we go, what should we do ... those were the main questions. After some research on the internet and checking out holiday brochures, we settled on a visit to the Canadian Rockies. That’s when the interesting part began.
Anyway we decided that a flight to Calgary, picking up a car and driving through the Rockies into Vancouver was the route to take. That’s when I contacted Sea2Sky, part of the Ski Safari family and started the proper planning, together with friendly and excellent help from Ally.
Flight with Air Canada, although it left slightly delayed (around 45 minutes), we made up the time and landed in Calgary on time. We were looked after very well and the service was efficient. No long queue at customs once we landed either. Luggage pick up was fairly prompt.
Car rental: bit of a wait in line, but paperwork was sorted quickly. No-one checked over the car with us though, but we did our own check anyway - they didn’t note our starting mileage either.
Sandman Hotel in Calgary was the first night’s stop. The location in downtown was really good, although we had a bit of a problem finding our way from the airport, as the road we thought it was on was actually for trams only, but we did work out how to find it after a bit of a drive around the block.
Anyway mission accomplished and we checked in. Reception staff was efficient and friendly. The room was clean and very comfortable. Excellent bar, with friendly helpful staff and the food was good too.
Brewster’s Mountain Lodge - Banff. Really easy to find and check in was efficient and the reception staff were really welcoming and friendly. This is an amazing place to stay, it felt just like your own mountain lodge and our room had a great view of the mountains. The room had its own balcony, a jacuzzi bath and its own stairs to go up to bed. Loved the decor of the room, which had a western feel to it. The bed was really comfortable.
Breakfast was included and we had the choice of tea/coffee, pastries, bagels, toast, cereals, juice, fresh fruit and yoghurt. Laundry room available too if you were planning a longer stay and needed the facilities. Perfect location as it was in the main part of town and handy for everything and plenty and varied eating places. Definitely a place we will stay again on another visit to these parts.
Lobstick Lodge - Jasper. Once again a very warm welcome and efficient check in. Our room was great too and had a mountain view again. The room was complete with a kitchenette with everything we needed if we wanted to cook for ourselves.
The lovely lady on reception advised that the hotel’s restaurant was closed the first evening for a private function but made a dinner recommendation at Embers Steakhouse, Marmot Lodge - we’re glad we took her advice and ate there as the food really was excellent - my husband had the ribs which were really tasty and the meat just fell off the bone. Breakfast the following morning (available at a reasonable cost) in the hotel was really good and the service was great too. The walk into the main part of Jasper is really easy and takes around 5/10 minutes.
Great place for lots of sightseeing and only 40 minutes to Lake Louise.
Our next stop was Sun Peaks and the Delta Sun Peaks Resort. Checking in was really easy and we were made to feel very welcome by Shirley. She gave us a run-down of the facilities available in the area and offered any help we needed to make our stay more enjoyable. It was quiet as it was just before the start of the main season but I can see the appeal of this area. Great in the winter for skiing and excellent in the summer for mountain biking, hiking and golf - lots of trails of different ability levels, great for all the family. The chair lift takes the bikes to the top of the mountain and you choose the trail you want to take back to the bottom.
Our room was perfect and the bed was really comfortable and once more the balcony gave us a view of the mountain where we watched and heard the ground squirrels going about their business. Saw plenty of black bears on the slopes; one of the highlights was spotting the mother bear with 2 young cubs (yes, we were a good distance away) and also in another spot on the mountain was a mother bear with a 2nd year cub ... all in all we spotted 14 bears on our stay in Sun Peaks. The area has several shops and eating places. We ate at the Irish bar and the food was lovely.
Delta Whistler Hotel - Whistler. Excellent welcome and prompt check in again. Our room was perfect - there was a living area, dining/cooking area, comfortable kingsize bed, bathroom and our own washing machine and tumble dryer - ideal for a long stay and home away from home. In the main part of the town and with a view of Whistler Mountain. Plenty to see and do and a great walk, or cycle, down by the lake is worth doing. Plenty of dining choices around the town. Whistler was a lively place to stay as it was the weekend and there were people in town for parties - we loved the buzz of the place with everyone having fun, but this didn’t mean it was noisy or anything like that, just a fun place to be.
Fairmont Hotel Vancouver - Vancouver. This was something else. Service was what you would expect, friendly and efficient and of a high calibre (not that we can criticise the service in any of our hotels). A great choice for our stay ... handy downtown location, not far from the metro station (if you don’t want to drive, walk or take the bus). Our room seemed huge (in fact the bedroom was bigger than our living room at home!) There were 3 big windows giving us 2 different views ... one overlooking the cathedral and the main street down to the waterfront and the other was a rooftop patio.
We didn’t use the restaurant, but the setting was perfect as was the bar area ... plenty of comfortable seats and soft music playing quietly so that conversation could take place. Afternoon tea looked great too, although we didn’t get chance to sample it for ourselves.
Driving
Really easy roads to drive and to navigate - even if, like us, you are using a map rather than a satnav.
Driving was really easy and there was very little traffic - easy to find your way around, even if you are using a map rather than a satnav! The road between Kamloops and Whistler was really scenic and had the added interest of some twisty roads instead of the straighter ones with sweeping corners. Our itinerary meant that the mileages we drove, on the days we were travelling to our next destination, were very manageable and there was plenty to see along the way which meant that even if you had a longer distance to drive, it didn’t feel like it was long.
Even driving in downtown Vancouver didn’t cause any problems, although it was obviously busier. If you have the time and where there’s the option, use the old highways as you never know what you might see along the way - we saw grizzly bear, black bear, several elk and black tailed deer as well as long horned sheep.
Scenery
Awesome seems really inadequate, but that’s what the scenery is. The mountains, with their rocky features and different shapes - some covered in snow or glaciers are definitely awe inspiring. The lakes are stunning, we couldn’t get over the colour of some of them and the mirror image reflections added something else too.
If I was asked to pick out one place above all others, I don’t honestly think I could as each place we visited had their own points of interest and were beautiful in their own right. Taking the cable car up the mountains (we did this in Jasper and Grouse Mountain, Vancouver) is certainly well worth doing as you get a different perspective on life. For me, seeing the wildlife is a big thrill, especially the bears - we were fortunate enough to see 16 in total. There’s nothing quite like seeing wild animals in their natural habitat.
The Columbia Icefields are well worth a visit, with a ride on the ‘ice coach’ ... great driver who told us about the glaciers and how the landscape was formed ... excellent sense of humour too!
Vancouver
We definitely could have stayed longer, but at least we have the excuse to return for another visit! There is so much to see and do, in and around the city. We managed to walk virtually all of Stanley Park, we visited the aquarium and took lunch at the Tea House in the park. Dr Sun Yat-Sen’s Classic Chinese Garden is a must see ... so calm and peaceful. Had a great visit to Grouse Mountain on North Vancouver too. If you don’t want to use a car around the city then the public transport options are varied and reasonable too. We bought a day pass ($9 when we visited) and this covers you for travel on the bus, metro or skytrain as well as the seabus ... well worth it and takes you all over the Vancouver area.
We were fortunate enough to be in Vancouver for Canada Day and there were plenty of celebrations going on all around the city. There was a big parade through some of the streets and then the finale was the firework display ... such a lovely end to a great holiday.
Suffice to say that we will be returning to this part of Canada and would recommend Ski Safari to anyone planning a visit. Thank you to Ally in particular as she was our main contact and was really helpful and knew her stuff, although Annika helped with a query when Ally was out of the office one day.
This holiday was to celebrate our special occasion and the memories of it will stay with us for a long time ... lots of photos to remind us too!!
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