Vancouver to Calgary the long way around

My son lives in Ontario but had never been to Canada’s west coast, so we decided to catch up over a big holiday. I booked the trip with him, his wife and my almost two-year-old grand-daughter. After a few days enjoying wandering around Vancouver with a trip to the aquarium and two to Granville Island markets, we picked up our seven-seater van, piled it with luggage and away we went. 

With so many islands and other seagoing traffic, the ferry rides in British Columbia are always interesting. Vancouver to Vancouver Island was no exception.

Our first stop was for two nights in Victoria. We had fantastic apartments that were very roomy as we got a free upgrade. We wandered the harbour and city centre on foot and, of course, we did a trip to the stunning Butchart Gardens. The gardens are a wonderful mix of colour, and I particularly loved the flower-filled hanging baskets.

We then headed north to Port Hardy for our next ferry ride. After dinner and a sleep we all stirred early and piled everyone and everything back into the van to get to the ferry terminal two hours before a 7.30am departure. There are several options on the ferry including cabins. We paid extra to have seats allocated in the forward lounge. It was a fantastic trip with spectacular views on either side, plus orca and humpback whales to add interest. The meals available on board were quite good, which included a barbecue on the deck. We arrived in Prince Rupert at 11.30pm and checked into our hotel. We stayed two nights in Prince Rupert to get our land legs back and see the town.  

Read more: Animal spotting in Canada’s beautiful natural landscapes
 
We planned our road trip to avoid doing more than 400km a day so we had time to stop and look at things along the way. On most days, we bought lunch at bakeries and specialist smoked food stores, packed them into a cold bag, then took advantage of town parks or roadside stops on our way. Along the Yellowhead Highway were stops and numerous walks to waterfalls. There was a wonderful walk in an ancient forest, a reminder that in Canada the old forests were felled in vast quantities and the pockets left are now a preserved novelty. The view from the car as we drove was of lakes, rivers, mountains and forests with several areas where the road runs alongside lakes for many kilometres. It was all quite spectacular.

Our next night was Smithers and then onwards again to Prince George where we had a fantastic dinner full of exotic flavours at the Shiraz Cafe and Restaurant, the best meal on the trip I thought. Then, onwards again.

As a health scare had thrown our original holiday plans into chaos all our booking was done late. We couldn’t get accommodation in Jasper at a reasonable price so we booked in Hinton. This is one of those unknowns that turned out to be wonderful. We did a TripAdvisor search of things to do in Hinton and The Beaver Boardwalk right in town but rather tricky to find was top of the list. It was a lovely walk and as nature lovers we enjoyed seeing the pond life even if there was an absence of actual beavers.

We took in the sights of the region and revisited Jasper. We saw an interesting mix of wildlife: big-horned sheep, elk, deer and black bears. 

After two days we were off to Banff and again due to late booking we couldn’t find reasonable accommodation in Banff so headed to Canmore.

After a fabulous trip we had to begin preparations to depart, so the by-now expert car packers piled the van to take us to Calgary where we visited an outlet mall – CrossIron Mills – to hunt up bargains. We booked into a great motel near the airport. I tend to look for apartment motels as they are often no dearer than ordinary motels but provide so much more.

Read more: 6 places in Canada that come alive in the winter

We had a lovely but rather sad farewell dinner then returned to the motel. The next day my son, daughter-in-law and grand-daughter headed home to Ontario after returning the van at the airport and a day later, already missing the others, we too headed home, in our case to South Australia.


I would thoroughly recommend this trip as we had a wonderful time. Most of the hotels we stayed at made sure our two rooms were close together so we could put the grand-daughter down at night and then use the baby monitor to keep an eye on her while hanging out together talking in our room. A note on translations, though: a portable cot is what we would call a folding bed and a playpen is what we call a portable baby cot.