Western Highlights & Inside Passage

Welcome to the third largest city in Canada. Join a brief group meeting this afternoon to get to know your fellow travellers.

Vancouver is one of the most beautifully situated cities in the world, framed by the Pacific Ocean and the Coast Mountains. Explore the heart of the city, including beautiful Stanley Park with its beaches, forests and ocean-side walking paths.

Leave the Pacific Coast behind and travel east to the beautiful Okanagan Valley. This sun-drenched region is home to countless award-winning vineyards and abundant orchards.

Today travel to the beautiful Canadian Rocky Mountains. Cross over the Rockies via Rogers Pass, the highest point of the Trans-Canada Highway. The road travels through several narrow gorges and canyons before reaching Kicking Horse Pass in Yoho National Park.

Banff National Park was established as Canada's first national park in 1885. Experience the spectacular canyons, waterfalls and mountain passes, and visit picturesque Lake Louise.

Today will be a highlight as you travel the famous Icefields Parkway. Along the way you'll see the snow-capped mountains and glaciers of the Columbia Icefield, with time for an optional Ice Explorer ride on the Athabasca Glacier. Stop at Maligne Canyon for views of one of the most impressive waterfalls in Canada before ending the day in the heart of Jasper National Park.

As you travel from Jasper you'll marvel at beautiful Moose Lake and Mount Robson, the tallest mountain in the Canadian Rockies. Today's destination is Prince George, the trading centre for sparsely populated northern British Columbia.

Continue westbound through a vast river and lake landscape, full of beaver dams and surrounded by forests as far as the eye can see.

Departing Smithers, stop at Moricetown Falls, a canyon where the local First Nation people fish for salmon, and then visit the Ksan Indian Village with its totem poles long houses. This afternoon, board the ferry in Prince Rupert for your journey through the Inside Passage.

As the ferry winds its way through the narrow straits and fjords of the Inside Passage, you will gain a good impression of the unique coastal landscape of northern British Columbia and Alaska. Cascading rivers and emerald rainforests nourish a wide variety of wildlife. Travelling by ferry provides a wonderful vantage from which to explore this road-less region.

As you sail past glaciers and picturesque islands watch for sea otters, sea lions and whales. Disembarking in Skagway, travel over the Klondike Highway to Whitehorse. Located on the banks of the Yukon River, Whitehorse was an important supply centre during the Klondike Goldrush of 1898, the greatest the world has ever seen.

Transfer to the airport where your journey ends.