Trip from Calgary to Victoria
 

Hi I am planning a trip to drive from Calgary to Victoria in one day February 9/10th and coming back the 13th. I have a 15 passenger van loaded with 12 people. Is this crazy or doable?

I Suppose that anything is doable, but crazy??? Hmmmm. It will take at least 12 hours of non stop driving to get to Vancouver, and that is if you dont have any weather or road delays. Feb. can be icy/snowy etc. Are you the only driver or are you sharing the driving?
The last ferry leaves for Victoria at 9PM and you need another hour to get there and be early enough.

Personally I would not want to do it, but it could be done if you leave early enough. Just prepare for the fact that there may be road delays and you could miss the ferry and have to overnight somewhere.

A friend of ours is a long-distance truck driver and had to travel that route frequently. He said it was the worst part of his Toronto-Vancouver trip and he often was delayed by weather for more than a day at that time of year. In nice weather it's a lovely trip, but I sure wouldn't consider it in February.

Crazy!

Calgary to Vancouver stopping only to refuel is an 11 hour drive in good summer road conditions. Expect it to be longer in the winter. To continue to Victoria you will have to take a 1 1/2 hour ferry ride out of Tsawwassen (~40 minutes from Vancouver) to Swartz Bay (~30 minutes from Victoria). And this doesn't include any wait time for the ferry.

For winter driving through the mountains, always be prepared to have to stop for the night due to road closures.

I vote for the crazy part!! I don't do that drive in one day during the summer.

We do this drive a lot and I hate doing it straight through, it is just makes for a very long and exhausting day. I just wouldn't do it in the winter unless I absolutely had to. Even during other times of the year we usually stay overnight somewhere along the way to break it up.

There is a chance you might start out from Calgary and not even get to Golden before you find out there is a delay or temporary highway closure. I used to work where the Greyhound buses came into Lake Louise. Many times in during the winter we would get informed that the bus was going to be hours late or was going to have to re-route down to Hwy 93 South to get around a problem on the highway in the mountains.

We do this drive a lot and I hate doing it straight through, it is just makes for a very long and exhausting day. I just wouldn't do it in the winter unless I absolutely had to. Even during other times of the year we usually stay overnight somewhere along the way to break it up.

There is a chance you might start out from Calgary and not even get to Golden before you find out there is a delay or temporary highway closure. I used to work where the Greyhound buses came into Lake Louise. Many times in during the winter we would get informed that the bus was going to be hours late or was going to have to re-route down to Hwy 93 South to get around a problem on the highway in the mountains.

My question would be do you have experience driving in winter conditions through the mountains? If not, then definitely would not recommend you do this trip. Especially with 12 other people's lives in your hands.

I do the drive a lot and have had trips that went easily and quickly and trips that didn't (18 hours one time).

One thing you should be aware of is the 12 passengers in the van thing. As part of my job last year, we transported people in the same size vans and were stopped on a few occasions by the RCMP in BC. Although we thought we were within the rules, the RCMP insisted that transporting over 10 people was not allowed unless one had a special drivers' licence. On one occasion they told us that transporting ANY number of passengers in such a van wasn't allowed without the special license. We disagreed but ultimately had to capitulate to avoid the hassle. Who knows who was right? I don't, but I DO know it's something I wouldn't really want to risk.

I should add that I am only talking about the Calgary-Vancouver part of the drive. The additional travel time with ferry, waiting, etc to get to Victoria adds a whole other chunk of time and in my opinion yes, it is crazy to even consider it.

Do you really want to seriously risk the lives of your 12 passengers???

In Alberta, a class 5 license (standard) has these restrictions (from http://www.servicealberta.gov.ab.ca/..._Licence.cfm):

<i>No holder of a Class 5 operator's licence shall operate a motor vehicle:

* That has a seating capacity of more than 15, while that vehicle is transporting any person in addition to the operator

* To transport passengers for hire</i>

In BC it is different (from http://icbc.com/driver-licensing/get...pes-licences):

<i>Class 5 or 7 B.C. driver’s licence passenger car

* Passenger vehicles used as school buses with seating capacity of not more than 10 persons (including the driver)</i>

So, if one has an Alberta license and starts a drive in Calgary with 12 people in a van, once they cross the border into BC is it now illegal? I'm guessing yes based on taggie's experience even if taggie has an Alberta license.

I also vote for "crazy". We always break that drive into two days, even in the summer.

Another thing I would suggest checking into is if, as a driver of one of those vehicles, there are requirements to keep a driver's log, and if there are limits on the number of hours a single driver is allowed to drive (I think it's 13 hours in a 24 hour period). I have a friend who was a volunteer driver for a community van (sounds similar to the one you will be driving), for school groups, Girl Guide groups, the ski team etc. and at one time, there were regulations such as these that were brought in and she said they applied not only to commercial drivers but also to volunteers like herself. This was in Alberta, by the way.