"Jasper National Park " a Jasper National Park Travel Page by JanPeter74

Jasper National Park forms a unity with Banff NP that lies to the south and the smaller parks Yoho and Kootenay that both lie to the west in British Columbia. Jasper is filled with typical Rocky Mountain scenery, such as impressive mountains, glaciers, forests, lakes, etc. Together with Jasper is bigger and less crowded than Banff, which is the most touristy of the four parks.

The most important town is Jasper townsite that lies more or less in the middle of the park. Here you find hotels, restaurants and shops.South of Jasper starts the Icefields Parkway, one of the most, if not THE most scenic, roads in the world, that leads all the way up to Lake Louise in Banff NP. This road passes an enormous amount of glaciers along the road, which are all coming of the Columbia Icefields. One of the largest icefields in the world (apart from north and south pole areas).

The most popular drive (take a couple of days for this) in the Rockies starts in Banff NP in the south, passes Banff, and Lake Louise, and then follows the Icefields Parkway into Jasper. Once you have reached Jasper townsite, you take the road to the west and drive west out of the park into British Columbia (passing Mount Robson Provincial Park, which is one of the highlights of a trip to Canada, so also not to be missed). Of course this trip can also be done the other way around. In that case, the views on the Icefields Parkway are perhaps even more spectacular.

Click here for a map of Jasper NP. This is the same map you receive when entering the park. Nice to know: You pay an entrance fee for the entire area (all four parks) at once. They just ask you how many days you plan to stay in the area and give you a ticket for this period.

Number 1 spot in this park: Mount Edith Cavell.