We are a family of four (parents and kids 9 and 14) and are looking at a Candian summer vacation. We could probably do 10 days at the most. We love everything outdoors. Our catch is that we have been saving my husband's hotel points for a while so we need to stay in certain places that have these hotels. Therefore, we have narrowed it to the following options:
1. Vancouver 3 nights
2. Victoria 3 nights
3. Whistler 3 nights

or

1. The Banff area (the hotel is actually in Canmore) for the whole time.

Is it possible to do both BC and Banff or is that too much driving? Are the mountains in the BC area as impressive as those in the Banff area? Thank you very much!

I think 3 places is too much for the time you have. If you haven't been before, I'd split it between Banff and Vancouver - although there is more than enough to do for 10 days in each place. If you have been before, I'd be tempted to spend the entire time in one place, but that's your call. If I had to pick one, I'd lean toward Banff considering your preference for outdoors and they're so many day trips you can take, eg Lake Louise.

We spent our honeymoon in Banff and Vancouver, so both are special to us and we've been back several times. BTW - the last couple of times we stayed in Canmore and found it was very convenient and less congested than Banff itself.

IMO the mountains around Vancouver don't compare to Banff - although both are beautiful. Around Vancouver they're lower and more like a "coastal range" while Banff is the Rockies at their most spectacular. We haven't been to Whistler so I can't compare that area.

With only 10 days I'd stay in the Banff area and do day trips from there. Canmore would be a great place to stay and you could do trips into Calgary, Drumheller, etc.

i'd either choose banff/canmore for the entire stay or do vancouver/whistler (you could slip in a day trip to one of the gulf islands too). personally, i think victoria is dull for kids.

If you're into outdoors, I'd say Banff as well - that part of the Rockies are beautiful and there's a ton to do in the great outdoors.

Vancouver is excellent as well, but the outdoorsy sort of stuff is either a bit farther away, or not quite so authentically outdoors (ie hiking in Stanley Park - technically outdoors, but only marginally).

Starwood points?

I would fly to Vancouver (4 nights), then drive to Banff (4nights), stopping for one night somewhere between the two (there is a Four Points in Kamloops if it is Starwood points that you have). Spend and your final night in Calgary where you drop the car and fly home.

The drive from Vancouver to Banff is two full days of driving with short stops here and there, but it is a spectacular drive and well worth it.

I forgot to say, I wouldn't spend 9 nights in Canmore, that is too long. If you are going to do the Rockies, spend 5 in Banff/Canmore and 4 in Jasper. But there are no options for using any sort of hotel points in Jasper!

Thank you all very much - very helpful information. I think our best bet is to do a Banff/Vancouver combination. I am so excited now!

The drive from Vancouver to Banff is NOT a full two day drive if you can drive 10 hours in a day.

Why not consider Calgary and Canmore? Calgary offers to pu you nearer to the Tyrell Museum of Paleontology - the best darn dinosaur bone pile on the planet,.

I have driven from Calgary to Vancouver in a single day and from Vancouver to Calgary in a single day several times. It can be done. But I sure would not want to do it that way if it was my first visit to the area.

If your departure point is Vancouver and you're heading towards the mountains, quite a good overnight stop, which is more than half way, is Revelstoke. Your kids might enjoy the hotel at Hidden Valley Gap.

The road from Revelstoke to Banff is particularly rich in scenic lookout points at which you can stop. Although the driving time from Revelstoke to Banff is about 4 hours, you easily could stretch it into an 8-hour day (and even then you will not have exhausted everything that the west end of Banff National Park has to offer, and you'll need to return to Moraine Lake, Lake Louise, Peyto Lake, etc., from your base in Canmore).

May I suggest the Vancouver page of my website. Not only have I jotted down my own thoughts about ways in which to spend time in Vancouver, but at the bottom of that page I have included links to dynamite websites that Vancouverites have created about their own city:

http://tinyurl.com/2cvee7

Another page of my website that may be of interest is called "Four Days in Lake Louise." It just as easily could be called "Four Days in Banff" or "Four Days in Canmore." It'll give you some ideas of what you can do from your base in Canmore:

http://tinyurl.com/fapqr

There would be merit in visiting the Royal Tyrrell Museum in Drumheller, which Cruiseryyc and Aramis mentioned, on the day that you drive from Canmore to Calgary. It would take you 3 hours to drive from Canmore to Drumheller if you bypassed Calgary's traffic by going Canmore - Cochrane - Airdrie - Beiseker - Drumheller. It would take you AT LEAST two hours to do any kind of justice to the Tyrell Museum. But I would give it longer than that if I were you. I would let the kids go on one of the guided outdoor walks in which museum staff will show them the strata in which fossils are found, etc. Allow an hour for lunch. Finally, allow 2 hours to drive to Calgary. So it will take you a minimum of 8 hours, and maybe more. But it would be worthwhile.

Mountain weather is very quirky, so I suggest you read my "What To Pack" page:

http://tinyurl.com/npoh2

Postscript.

There will be days on which you will stop at scenic lookout points and on which you will do sight seeing while you're in transit from one destination to another. I'm thinking of the days on which you drive from Vancouver to Canmore, especially the second of those two days, and the day on which you drive from Canmore to Calgary. On those days you will not be able to lock your passports in your hotel safe. Therefore you should keep them with you when you get out of your car. Keep your luggage in the locked trunk of your car. Do not leave valuable items, such as cameras, on a car seat.

Before we travel outside the country, we photocopy the photo pages of our passports, our driver's licences, our travel insurance card, and the credit cards that we're taking with us. We make three sets of photocopies. My husband takes one set of photocopies on the trip, but stores the photocopies separately from his original documents. I take one set of photocopies on the trip, and store the photocopies separately from my original documents. Finally, we leave a third set of photocopies with a trusted person back home. We have never been in an emergency in which we've needed our trusted person to fax photocopies of our passports to a Canadian consulate in a foreign city. However, we have known people who have taken these precautions, and who have been spared a great deal of inconvenience because they had taken them.

Canada generally is a safe country, and it's unlikely that anything untoward will happen while you're here. But even in Canada I like to have Plan B, and preferably Plan C as well.

My apologies for coming late to this discussion, but...

If you stick to the coast, you get mountains -- Whistler, or just cross the bridge from downtown Vancouver and climb -- plus you get a big city and water and ferry boatd and lots of other things kids love.

If you go to Banff, you'd bore the heck out of my urban-oriented children, but maybe your kids would love to see trees and rocks day after day.

And it's a long drive from Vancouver to Banff.

If you get to Canmore, yes, there are city-like things to do in Calgary, and, with luck, you can find a small town rodeo, which is well worth devoting a day to.

But if it was me... and I've been there with children ... is the BAnff, Victoria, Vancouver circuit, with two nights max in Victoria.

BAK

I'm sorry if I wasn't clear. I meant it would take you two days Vancouver to Banff with stops along the way. (a leisurely two days, not a packed two days of driving).

Whistler not outdoorsy enough?! Come on!!
The drive from Vancouver to Calgary is a beautiful drive, the scenery is breathtaking...though it may not be overly interesting to your kids until they see wildlife on the side of the road! Victoria may be boring to some but the ferry ride has always been a fun thing for our kids to do. Once on the island, you could book a whale watching tour, We had killer whales come within inches of our boat last summer, awesome experience for our friends from Texas!
I would also go to Whistler, always a great time for us...we're there at least 3-4 weekends in the summer and NEVER bored! Vancouver also has endless things to do for young and old. You'll have a great time, just hope for sun....

We had a great vacation with our kids (then 10 and 13) with a similar itinerary.

We flew into Vancouver and spent 1 night there (Starwood - Westin Bayshore). Rode bikes in Stanley Park, went to the aquarium, had a great dinner, even sat by the pool a bit.

Then we drove to Whistler and spent 4 nights there. We stayed in a Club Intrawest condo (had to sit thru their 2 hour timeshare salespitch). Lots of fun activities in Whistler: golf, kayak, hike, etc And a cute village to shop in.

On the way to the Rockies, we stayed overnight at the Fourpoints Sheraton in Kamloops.

Then we spent 3 nights at Emerald Lake Lodge in Yoho National Park. Google it to find the website and you will flip. A true gem! We hiked, canoed, and rode horses. Also did a day trip to Lake Louise and drove the Icefield Parkway. Amazing!

On the way to Calgary for our flight back home, we stopped in Banff. Very beatuiful. We did one of their more popular hikes (can't remember the name offhand), but it was wall-to-wall people. A bit disappointing.

The trip all-in-all was spectacular and enjoyed by everyone in the family.

happy planning!

dina

Thanks for all of the information. I checked out the sites by Judy in Calgary and they are great. One final series of questions - is Banff too crowded in June or July to really "experience" it? Is one of these months better than the other? Thanks again for the valuable tips.

Canadian summer vacation begins right at the end of June and, unlike Europeans, Canadians (and Americans) don't usually wait until August to take their vacations. Once school is out you will see an increase in the number of tourists in Banff (anywhere, for that matter), but don't let that make you think June will be "peaceful". Banff and the Canadian Rockies are a treasure that always attracts throngs of tourists.

But, to answer your questions, June would be better if the number of tourists is the deciding factor. Late June weather is likely to be as nice as July, but early in June there could still be some cool days and chilly evenings

I agree with what Aramis has said about timing. If you want to travel in the early part of summer, the latter half of June is best. Although it's starting to get busy, as Aramis said, it's not quite as busy as July and August. Yet you are guaranteed to see Moraine Lake at it's turquoise best, which is not something that can be said for early June.

If you wanted to start your trip a bit earlier in June, you could arrive in Vancouver at that time. The coast has a milder climate than the mountains, and the coast warms up way sooner than the Rockies do. The ideal would be to reach the Rockies no sooner than the middle of June.