The Rockies Are Calling—and Canadians Should Answer

Like many of the 70 percent of Canadians who own passports, I have spent the last few years since the end of covid restrictions. Traveling the world. Seeing cool fun places like Greece and Turkey and Vietnam and Cambodia, all destinations of increasing interest to Québecois and Canadians. 

But recent developments to the south of us have shifted some of our thinking about travel, even those of us who weren't traveling to the United States to begin with and made us think a little bit more about Canada, and being Canadians, and a place as there are to travel here that either we've never been to to, or haven't in quite some time. 

I'm writing to you from the highway between Calgary and Banff, sitting aboard a 60-person Brewster Express bus with two passengers onboard because hey, this is oil country, as soon as the first Rocky mountain hove into view, despite the fact that I once lived in Calgary, despite the fact that my grandmother was from Banff, the shock and awe and beauty of it all hit me as strongly as it ever has. 

These mountains are freaking gorgeous. 

I'll be seeing the Himalayas for the first time soon and I'm sure those are lovely as well. And there's a certain charm to hiking up an Ande or two to picnic on a meadow overlooking the border between Chile and Argentina. But there's nothing to match the variety, the majesty, and of course above all, the unmitigated Canadianness of these majestic mountains. And this whole part of the country. 

(Photo Credit: Bert Archer)

As I look around Banff on this National Patriots Day weekend - or Victoria Day around here - I see and hear people from South Asia, from China, from Japan, and from France and from the U.S.. And everyone, and I do mean practically everyone, who works here is from Australia. But among the tourists, I can detect nobody who seems to be from Canada. There must be somen about, but few enough that I miss them entirely.

I have a theory as to why : Banff is a cliché. 

For Canadians, many of us who visited as children, the idea of going to Banff, or Jasper, for a vacation can seem roughly the equivalent of standing in line at Schwartz’s. Why would we bother? Been there, done that. There are new, better, more exciting places to go, in Canada (like Tofino or Fogo Island), and elsewhere (Tulum! Angkor Wat! Svalbard!). Going to Banff might seem like a failure of the imagination.

But I dare any Canadian to drive north from Calgary, spot those first foothills open up into the snowy, rocky peaks, until you are surrounded by them, embraced by them. These are our mountains, and they are unmatched for their beauty, their grandeur, and their sheer rockiness.

I got to talking to the security guard at the undeservedly empty Whyte Museum. He seemed to agree. I noticed a slight accent as we spoke English and switched to French. Turns out he’s from NDG; Sherbrooke near Westminster, he told me. He cycled to the Rockies 35 years ago and fell in love.

Though I heard quite a bit of French in both Banff and Jasper, the guard was unique in being French Canadian. We go to Cuba and Martinique, Guadeloupe and Punta Cana. But now that we’re not going to Florida or Arizona, let’s get the Rockies back on our radar. That security guard looked pretty lonely.

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