Bowser Goes to Banff
Issue 99
• Travel
•
A Fido-Friendly Mountain Adventure
By Jane Cassie
There are fringe benefits to being a dog owner. Along with free kisses, surprise wake-up calls, and the occasional sock theft, you also get a personal trainer who never skips leg day. Especially when hiking the trails around Banff National Park and Lake Louise.
“Sorry, there’s no exception to the pet rule,” the ticket seller says, stone-faced. “No dogs allowed onboard.”
We’re at the Sunshine Village Ski Resort parking lot, where a shuttle bus ferries humans to alpine splendor. Sitting neatly between us, ears alert and tail at half-mast, is Kalli—our trail-tested dog and self-appointed adventure coordinator. She looks up as if to say, Surely this rule does not apply to me.
It does.
“There’s another option,” my husband Brent says, pointing at the map. “We can hike the whole way.”
I sigh. Loudly. Part frustration, part fear. We’ve recently completed the 18-kilometre round trip to the Plain of Six Glaciers—a trek softened by two tea houses and banana bread that Kalli rated highly. But Healy Pass climbs higher. Much higher.
“I’m not sure my boomer quads are up for this,” I mutter. “And are we sure our pooch knows what she’s signed up for?”
Kalli, meanwhile, is busy conducting an olfactory investigation of the parking lot. She seems confident.
Trails, Tails and Mountain Views
Banff quickly proves itself to be a canine paradise. On the Bow River Loop, an easy interpretive stroll near our Lake Louise campsite, Kalli’s ears operate like satellite dishes—locking onto burbling American dipper, cheeping ruby-crowned kinglet, and the steady percussion of yellow-bellied sapsucker hammering sap from riverside spruce. I admire the scenery. Kalli studies the smells.
She’s equally enthusiastic on the Spray River Loop, prancing across bridges and peering into Bow Falls as if she might spot something edible.