Our two hour drive to Banff turned into a 6 hour drive! Here’s what happened. We saw a BEAR! Our first black bear, up close and personal from the safety our car. But more about that later.

The road to Banff goes through the Kootenay national park, so we had to buy a day pass. The man told us all the campgrounds between Banff and Jasper were still closed for the season, so that’s kinda thrown a spanner in the works. And someone else told us the Alaska highway is closed due to wildfires. We’ll just have to wait and see.

We drove through the Kootenay national park and it was stunning. Jagged mountains and turquoise rivers reminded me of mount cook but on a much larger scale.

And then we saw the bear. A car was stopped with its hazard lights on, a tell tale sign something is worth seeing. And there it was. A giant black bear just casually walking past, conveniently next to a pull in.

I got some good footage and we continued on. There were some hikes to do along the way and we chose the marble canyon walk which was incredible. Steep canyon walls with a waterfall and stream flowing through it.

Back on the road we saw a giant big horned sheep with huge horns.

We finally made it to Banff. we were worried the campground would be full, but thankfully we got a nice spot overlooking a mountain. There are elk casually strolling by, elk poo all over our campsite. There is also a cougar in the park we have to watch out for.

The town of Banff itself was very busy when we drove through and probably going to be too touristy for our liking.

After settling into our campsite, we caught the free shuttle bus into Banff town. We went to the visitor centre to get some info.

Banff is a picturesque little town surrounded by mountains. We were expecting it to be horribly touristy, and for sure, everyone here is a tourist but it had a cool vibe. And as we are off season, it wasn’t too busy.

A queue was formed outside a shop called Beaver tails. I asked a couple of girls what they were and she said it was a Canadian thing. They looked delicious and we thought we’d see if the queue looked smaller after our walk.

As luck would have it, there was another beaver tails shop at the other end of town with no queue, but same chain. So we ordered one.

It’s basically a bread dough deep fried, then topped with your choice of topping. We opted for brownie, which was chocolate spread, crumbled chocolate cookie, and white chocolate chunks. I’m not gonna lie, it’s one of the most delicious things I’ve ever eaten. It’s a pity I had to share it with Mike!

A bit more of a wander through town before catching the bus back. We’d been warned about a cougar in the camp and they come out at dusk. As we walked back to our camp at dusk i kept my eyes peeled. But there were only stacks of elk. And I mean loads of them!

What a great day. And did I mention we saw a bear?