1,000 Places to See in the U.S.A. & Canada Before You Die (131 page)

There’s a long, rich history between the Brewster family and nearby Banff National Park (see p. 1025). After the Banff Springs Hotel was established in 1888, the Brewsters provided milk from their farm homestead just outside park boundaries to hotel guests. They were the first to lead guided pack trips into the park’s backcountry, and as Banff grew in popularity for tourism in the early 20th century, so did the family’s involvement.

In 1923, the family transformed their original 1880s farm into a guest ranch, offering cowboy wannabes horseback vacations in the surrounding wilderness. After five generations, the Brewster family is still running the picture-perfect 2,000-acre guest ranch. The original 1920s lodge is full of Western atmosphere, serving as guest headquarters, while comfortable TV-free accommodations are offered in modern chalets and cabins around a wooded glade.

With this stunning setting, you’ll want to get outdoors and go Western. Lucky guests are offered a variety of horseback rides along the Bow River, plus multiday pack trips to back-country cabins. In addition to horseback adventures, the guest ranch offers its own nine-hole golf course, river rafting, and canoe trips, plus access to myriad possibilities for hikers and anglers. There’s not much that can’t be arranged, and with a smile. If you’re hankering for some Western entertainment, the Brewsters offer group rodeos, western barbecues, live country music, and that traditional cowboy favorite—sitting around the campfire. If you think that sounds a little bit hokey, just look at the faces of the three-generation families who come back here year after year.

W
HERE
: 32 miles/52 km east of Banff. Tel 800-691-5085 or 403-673-3737;
www.kananaskisguestranch.com
.
C
OST
: from US$176/C$198, including dinner and breakfast; horseback rides from US$49/C$55.
W
HEN
: June–Sept.
B
EST TIME
: last weekend in July for the Canmore Folk Music Festival (
www.canmorefolkfestival.com
).

A Tribute to Plains Indian Culture

Fort MacLeod, Alberta

For over 5,500 years, Plains Indians gathered to hunt American bison, commonly referred to as buffalo, at a windswept site in southern Alberta. Because their lifestyle was so dependent on hunting buffalo,
they developed numerous techniques. The most sophisticated method was the buffalo jump, in which thunderous herds of buffalo were stampeded off cliffs and then butchered for their meat, hides, and horns. Here, where the foothills of the Rocky Mountains meet the prairies, natural conditions and geologic features combined to create a perfect buffalo jump—and the interpretive center and museum you’ll find here today is an invaluable window to the culture and ways of the Plains Indians.

Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump Interpretive Centre is one of the oldest and best-preserved jumps in the world, designated a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1981. It is just one part of an extensive communal hunting complex that included Native encampments and meat-processing areas plus a network of sophisticated drive lanes used to direct the herds toward the cliffs.

For the First People of the Great Plains, the bison was the staff of life. The hide provided tepee coverings and leather for moccasins; the flesh was eaten fresh in season and preserved for later consumption. The bones were used to create a number of tools, and dried manure was used in campfires. Even the dried tail was used, as a flyswatter.

The five-level Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump Interpretive Centre is built into the slope bordering the jump’s sandstone cliff. Trails lead to the top, with staggering views across the prairies and to the Rockies, shimmering in the distance. On Sundays in winter, the center presents a learning series on Blackfoot arts and culture, with classes on subjects such as beading and bow-and-arrow making, while on Wednesdays in July and August the plaza is filled with the music and dancing of some of the best dancers and drum groups in Blackfoot country. In summer, visitors can take part in a tepee camping experience. Kids will love learning about traditional Blackfoot tepee-making, discovering how to “live off the land,” and taking part in storytelling around the campfire.

The center includes exhibits on the natural plains ecosystem and the culture of the Blackfoot, who dominated these prairies until the near-extermination of the buffalo, in the 1880s. More than 600 Blackfoot—a quarter of the tribe’s population at the time—died of starvation during the winter of 1884, after the buffalo had been eliminated from the plains. About 15,000 Blackfoot now live in reservations that straddle the border of Montana and Alberta.

W
HERE
: 104 miles/167 km south of Calgary. Tel 403-553-2731;
www.head-smashed-in.com
.
Cost:
tepee camping, US$147/C$165 per tepee (for group of 4 or less).
B
EST TIMES
: mid-May–mid-Sept for weather and tepee camping. June 21 is National Aboriginal Day with special Blackfoot entertainment, storytelling, and events.

All Adventure, All the Time

Alberta

An outdoors lover’s dream come true, Jasper National Park has more of a recreational focus than Banff National Park, its magnificent neighbor to the south (see p. 1025). As Canada’s largest mountain park,
Jasper ropes in more than 4,200 square miles of towering peaks, broad lake-filled valleys, and dense forests of spruce and fir, so there’s a lot of room to play, and it’s year-round fun. In summer, you’ll want to get out and raft some roiling white water, saddle a horse for a trail ride, or canoe a mirror-still mountain-ringed lake. Luckily, a small army of outfitters is here to make your every outdoor dream come true.

Hiking opportunities abound, with trails snaking through narrow Maligne Canyon and beyond, and rafting trips are available on the mighty Athabasca and Sunwapta rivers. Many trails are also open to mountain bikers, making this a popular park for fat-tire adventurers. Angling on Maligne Lake (the largest of the Rockies’ glacier-fed lakes) can be heaven, while the Miette Hot Springs offer soaks in outdoor pools, surrounded by forest and mountains. During the snowy months, snow-shoeing, ice-skating, and skiing at Ski Marmot Basin are but a few of the temptations. Marmot offers some of the least crowded slope conditions in the Rockies, making it a favorite of in-the-know snowboarders and skiers looking for some alone time.

Climb a rocky walkway to see Jasper National Park’s Pyramid Mountain.

Fortunately, there’s nothing rugged about creature comforts in Jasper. The village was born as a railway town, and instead of Banff’s upscale shoppers, you’ll find outdoors folks who look as if they just spent the afternoon rafting or snowshoeing. The park’s most exclusive destination by far is Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge. This venerable resort resembles an idealized summer camp, with lodgings ranging from comfortable all the way to sumptuous in a wide mix of cabins, chalets, and cottages in a woodsy 900-acre lakeside setting. The lodge’s Stanley Thompson golf course makes it a perennial choice as Canada’s No. 1 golf resort. It offers ten excellent dining rooms and bars; the Moose’s Nook Northern Grill is a favorite for inventive Rocky Mountain cuisine featuring local fish, game, and regional specialties in a setting of rustic elegance, accompanied by outstanding wines from the nearby Okanagan Valley (see p. 1042).

W
HERE
: 178 miles/287 km north of Banff. Tel 780-852-6176;
www.pc.gc.ca/pn-np/ab/jasper
.
S
KI
M
ARMOT
B
ASIN
: Tel 780-852-3816;
www.skimarmot.com
.
When:
ski season late Nov–early May.
Cost:
lift ticket US$52/C$59.
F
AIRMONT
J
ASPER
P
ARK
L
ODGE
: Tel 800-441-1414 or 780-852-3301;
www.fairmont.com/jasper
.
Cost:
from US$177/C$199 (off-peak), from US$443/C$499 (peak); greens fees from US$120/C$140 (US$103/C$120 for guests); dinner at Moose’s Nook US$36/C$40.
B
EST TIMES
: Jan–Mar for snow sports; July–Sept for hiking.

The Park with Million-Dollar Views

Alberta

Waterton Lakes National Park butts up against the U.S.-Canada border, beyond which spreads Glacier National Park in Montana to the south (see p. 620): Together they form the massive Waterton-Glacier
International Peace Park. Waterton is famous for its string of deep lakes shimmering beneath the Continental Divide’s jagged peaks, and for its stunning vistas—all the products of Ice Age glaciers. An excellent way to view the park’s monumental landscape is on the Waterton Inter-Nation Shoreline Cruise, an excursion boat that leaves from the tiny hamlet of Waterton Park and plies Upper Waterton Lake to Goat Haunt, right over the border in Montana’s Glacier National Park. Paddling and kayaking is also a great way to explore the otherwise vertical landscapes. Cameron Lake, at the end of the scenic Akamina Parkway, offers boat rentals and a sheltered spot for canoeing, while the more lively water of Upper Waterton Lake—the deepest lake in the Canadian Rockies—is better for experienced paddlers. Grizzly bears frequent the shores of Cameron Lake (in Glacier National Park), and viewing these magnificent, though sometimes ferocious, creatures from the safety of a boat is smart—and a top park experience.

Waterton was one of Alberta’s first tourist destinations—in fact, the golf course here is one of the oldest in the province—and venerable lodges and hotels lend the village the air of a civilized wilderness outpost. The park boasts breathtaking scenery at every turn, but its grandest view belongs to the Prince of Wales Hotel, built on a bluff above the lake in 1926 by the Great Northern Railroad. Take tea in the parlor, but spend the night at the Waterton Lakes Lodge, a top-notch modern resort complex offering large, comfortable rooms, a woodsy New West decor, and a host of welcome health club facilities.

W
HERE
: 164 miles/264 km south of Calgary. Tel 403-859-2224;
www.pc.gc.ca/waterton
.
W
ATERTON
I
NTER
-N
ATION
S
HORELINE
C
RUISE
: Tel 403-859-2362;
www.watertoninfo.ab.ca/m/cruise.html
.
When:
May–mid-Oct.
P
RINCE OF
W
ALES
H
OTEL
: Tel 403-859-2231;
www.princeofwaleswaterton.com
.
W
ATERTON
L
AKES
L
ODGE
: Tel 888-985-6343 or 403-859-2151;
www.watertonlakeslodge.com
.
Cost:
from US$88/C$99 (off-peak), US$191/C$215 (peak).
When:
mid-Apr–mid-Nov.
B
EST TIMES
: Jan–Mar for cross-country skiing; July–Sept for hiking.

Waterton Lakes National Park contains 203 square miles of rugged mountains and wilderness—and plenty of scenic vistas.

A Special Island Retreat for Social Change

Cortes Island, British Columbia

To reach Hollyhock—Canada’s leading educational retreat center—by car from Vancouver requires three different ferries and takes at least six hours to travel just 100 miles (as the spirit flies). But once you reach Cortes Island
and arrive at this world-famous 48-acre community devoted to progressive thought and action, it doesn’t feel remote. Hollyhock has long attracted some of the top intellectuals, writers, artists, and activists from around the world, and is an important locus for people dedicated to issues of the spirit, environment, and social growth. Located above a sandy beach amid dense fir and cedar forests, Hollyhock is a marvelous place to find inspiration and to enjoy nature’s beauty.