A four-day Rockies road trip – Vancouver to Canmore
September 29, 2022
Our Rockies road trip came about because we couldn’t get a car rental. Trying to get a car rental after the pandemic is an almost impossible mission in this very popular tourist spot. Add onto that trying to get a rental with a different drop-off point and it becomes impossible. Believe me, a car is essential if you want to see the beauty of the Rockies and you want to walk some of the trails. As it turns out renting a car from and returning it to Vancouver was not a problem. Oh no, do we have to extend our trip to enable us to rent a car and in the process see even more fabulous things? Let me think…oh, ok then.
The Rockies road trip "Mission"
To get to Calgary in 4 days so we could pick-up our friends from the airport and start our adventure. A Rockies road trip of almost 1000km and 11 hours of driving.
The Rockies road trip - The Plan:
To make this Rockies road trip NOT feel like 4 days of sitting in a car driving. D-U-L-L, dull. We call ourselves “stop-aholics” when we’re walking; water break, photo opportunity, take layers off, put layers on, get the binoculars out to look at something, snack break, lunch break, you get the picture. I’m amazed we ever get anywhere. We decided to apply said “stop-aholic-alism” (I know, a bit of a mouthful) to our Rockies road trip. 11 hours of driving, 4 days, how many stops could we possibly apply to said mission?
The Rockies road trip "Route"
Rejecting the obvious “Sea to Sky Highway” that goes through Whistler (been there, done that, got the 2009 winter Olympics cap). For the first leg of our Rockies road trip, we decided to take Highway 1 from Hope to Savona. From there we went through Revelstoke, Glacier National park, Golden and finally to Banff.
Could we have done it quicker? Yes. Would we have had as much fun? Definitely No.
Day 1 - Vancouver to Savona. The stops...
- Bridal Veil Falls Provincial Park
- Harrison Hot Springs
- The Town of Hope
- Alexander Bridge Provincial Park
- Hells Gate
- Kamloops Lake for a swim from our beautiful little B&B, Lakeside Country Inn
Bridal Veil Falls Provincial Park
First stop, Bridal Veil Falls Provincial Park. A short 10-minute walk through stunning woodland to get to the base of the falls. P.S there are bathroom facilities at most of the stops. Added bonus.
Harrison Hot Springs
The next stop we decided on was only 20 minutes away (slight detour, but worth it) to Harrison Hot Springs and Harrison Lake. Our first real view of the mountains we were aiming for and a great tea break.
The town of Hope
We stopped in the town of Hope hoping to pick up something for lunch, but were surprised to find this was the town wrecked by Sylvester Stallone’s Rambo in the movie “First Blood”. Who knew? We were also delighted to find Hope hosts an annual chainsaw carving contest and examples of the entrants are all over the town.
Alexander Bridge Provincial Park
Another stop to merely stretch our legs, this one just a 15 minute walk to the very picturesque bridge over the Fraser Canyon. Top tip, ignore the no entry sign over the train track…it’s the only way to get to the bridge (please look both ways).
Hells Gate
Well worth a stop for the cable car ride over the Fraser Canyon and the amazing views. On the other side of the river there’s a suspension bridge you can walk on for more amazing views. There’s also 2 museums, one showing the story of the salmon that travel up the river to spawn. It highlights the devastating effect of a landslide that had 10,000 salmon bashing themselves to death on the rocks in their sole goal of reaching their birth-place to spawn. The other is the history of Chinese workers (let’s call it what it is..slaves) brought over to build the railway lines.
The force of the Fraser River as it charges through the canyon is amazing, and when we visited it had a low water level..
The Road Views
The journey started with a few hills and some mountains in the distance, an abundance of green from trees and farming land, and frequent glimpses of lakes and rivers. It ended only 4 hours later in a dry, arid mountainy landscape. A complete contrast from the start and one we were fascinated by.
Lake Kamloops
What better way to end the first day than with a dip in Lake Kamloops.
Day 2 - Savona to Revelstoke. The stops...
Day two on this Vancouver to the Rockies road trip was a lot less busy than day 1. Less stops but still amazing scenery. Our stops:
- Kamloops lake viewpoint
- Monte Lake
- Historic O’Keefe Ranch and Museum (Quite interesting but the tour was rather long and there were no food facilities…boo).
- A walk around Revelstoke in the evening. The Craft Bierhaus for a local beer and “The Taco Club” for dinner. They do Tacos so well over here.
The Rockies road-trip “car-cam” views…
Day 3 - Revelstoke to Golden. The stops...
- Revelstoke National Park
- Glacier National Park
- Hemlock Grove/Giant Cedars Trail
- Meeting of the waters trailhead
- Bear Creek Falls trailhead
Revelstoke marks the starting edge of the National Park systems on our small Rockies road trip. This means a “National Park Pass” is required to be able to visit and even pass through some of the parks.
National Park Pass
You need one of these to visit any of the national parks. On this route, we were able to buy one at the Revelstoke National Park visitor gate. Probably the best bet is to purchase one on-line before your trip. We didn’t know this, isn’t hindsight a wonderful thing? Other useful information:
The pass for a day is $21. It is valid until 4pm the day after purchase (so effectively 2 days if you buy it early on day 1). However, a yearly pass is approx $145. Their recommendation is that if you’re there for 7 days or more, it’s more economic to buy the yearly pass. Ok, I get it 7 * $21 is $147, so yes. However, said daily pass lasts until 4pm the next day..2 days. So surely you would need to be there 14 days to make the yearly pass viable. I’m just saying.
Revelstoke National Park
A great park where you drive along the ‘Meadows in the Sky parkway’; The one road that winds up Mount Revelstoke with various pull-outs where you can take a short stroll to some viewpoints. At the end of the road there are various hiking options of differing lengths, the shortest of which takes you to the Historic Fire Lookout and some great views (at 6360 feet, that’s 1939 meters – without the climb!).
Glacier National Park
Can I just say, Wow! The sheer scale and quantity of the mountains as you drive through the parkway is amazing.
There are plenty of places to stop, stretch your legs and take in some amazing views. Hemlock Grove and Giant Cedars Trail were our planned stops, but alas due to forest fires, they were closed. Instead, we stopped at the meeting of the waters trailhead. A lovely 20 minute hike to, literally, where two waterways meet. A great place to stop for lunch. There are even some red Adirondack chairs to enjoy your lunch and the view from. If anyone is looking for a fun challenge there are 200+ red chairs all over parks of Canada in beautiful remote locations. We found a few on our travels:
Our other stop was at the Bear Creek Falls trail – a steep descent, but well worth it to see a beautiful and very forceful waterfall. We may have got a tad wet.
The 4th and final day - Golden to Canmore. The stops...
- Emerald Lake
- Takakkaw Falls
Emerald Lake
What a day to finish our Rockies road trip. We started the day early at Emerald Lake. Don’t be put off by the amount of people here. They pretty much don’t venture beyond the bridge and that left us with the lake to ourselves as we took a walk around its perimeter. It’s still one of our favourite walks from our time in the Rockies. Highly recommended.
Takakkaw Falls
This was our first experience of what a “Rockies” waterfall could look like. A short 10 minute stroll took us to the base of the falls with spectacular views along the way.
What did we learn? Avoid those "hindsight" moments.
- Definitely research and decide on your route. This is only one option. There are others, some of which are a bit dull (i.e. highway 1 all the way). Check out our return trip in 2 days (to come).
- Pick places to stop en-route. I researched before we went and I’m so glad I did. Without knowing the stop-offs, we would definitely have missed some great experiences.
- If you decide on a yearly “Discovery Pass”, purchase it on-line before you go at Canada parks.
- If you are there for less than 14 days and don’t mind buying a pass every 2 days, it will work out cheaper. However, check locations where you can buy the daily pass at Canada Parks. The main places are Revelstoke NP, Glacier NP (Rogers Pass), Banff NP (main road in) and Jasper, but there are others. See above for more info
- For a bit of fun check out the Red chairs in various locations in the National Parks of Canada #ShareTheChair.
WOW! fabulous pictures, definetly worth the trip.
What a lovely read , and super photos .so glad you are enjoying your adventure
Mumxx
Looks beautiful. Thanks for sharing!!