For insights into the long history of Alberta’s First Nations peoples, trace a loop south from Calgary through dramatic landscapes that have been used, shaped and adorned by Blackfoot and other Indigenous communities over many millennia. And though road-tripping is the way to reach off-the-beaten-track destinations, be ready to lace up walking shoes or grab paddles to immerse yourself in the wilder reaches.
Hire a car at Calgary International Airport and head south down Highway 22 – officially named Cowboy Trail – dawdling through Diamond Valley, a swathe of verdant farmland, microscopic towns and rolling foothills with the Kananaskis mountain range above the distant horizon. That road ends at the junction with Crowsnest Highway, leading west to its namesake pass, home to a collection of tiny hamlets. The road to Crowsnest Pass cuts through rubble ridges – the eerie remains of the Frank Slide, where Canada’s deadliest landslide buried dozens of people in 1903.
En route, enjoy an experiential lesson in Albertan mining history at the Bellevue Underground Mine. Spend the night in a rustic cabin and learn about the pass’s murky and murderous Prohibition past. Return east along Highway 3 to embrace the wild by camping in Castle Provincial Park, paddling and fishing on Beaver Mines Lake, hiking up Table Mountain or cooling down with a dip in Castle Falls. Then veer south on Highway 6 to reach Waterton Lakes National Park which, together with neighbouring Glacier National Park across the US border in Montana, is a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve…
