Beautiful Banff

With the calming tones of Dido we finally pulled away from very average Calgary 2 hours late. Yes it was back on that Greyhound but this time only for a mere 2 hours. Last minute stand-in driver Rob, confirmed that we were on-route west but with no real time of arrival known. But what he was sure of was that we would get there at some point today!

Onroute to Banff we picked up a few more easy going Canadians still smiley faced, despite the delay. The pick up was in a great looking village called Canmore, nestled neatly into the base of the Rockies that seemed to run right to the seats of the bus stop. Canmore looked a much better alternative to average Calgary - oh the beauty of hindsight! But I guess it can be good to spend time in average-ville so that when you hit hi-town nothing is then taken for granted. And we won't be taking things for granted in Banff

Under a cloudless cobalt sky we pulled into Banff. A unique mountain community pretty much on par with Jasper, located within Canada's first National Park and world heritage site. At 4,800 ft it is the community with the second highest elevation in Canada. Banff is the capital of the Canadian Rockies and even at this time of year these huge gigantic mountains that surround the village still have loaded channels of snow. This village gets flooded with as many as 50,000 tourists a day in the high summer season! And with landscapes like these its easy to see why.

From the bus station to the main high street we instantly knew we would like this place over very average Calgary. Our crappy hostel glitch was short lived as the Banff hostel was amazing. The HI (Hostel International) seem to have this game cracked