Canada
Banff
Turquoise glacial lakes so impossibly blue they look digitally edited.
The water in Banff's glacier-fed lakes is so impossibly blue-green that first-time visitors stop dead, convinced the photos were edited. They weren't. The colour comes from light refracting through glacial rock flour suspended in the meltwater, and it shifts with the sun from turquoise to teal to cobalt.
Banff National Park is Canada's oldest and most visited national park, established in 1885 when railway workers discovered the Cave and Basin hot springs. The park holds three of the world's most photographed lakes — Minnewanka, Moraine, and the smaller but equally vivid Vermilion Lakes. Elk wander through Banff townsite at dusk, utterly unbothered by pedestrians. The Banff Upper Hot Springs sit at 1,585 metres, steaming in the open air with Rundle Mountain filling the skyline. The Icefields Parkway connects Banff to Jasper through 230 kilometres of glacier-studded highway, passing more than 100 glaciers visible from the road. Gondola rides to Sulphur Mountain summit offer 360-degree views of six mountain ranges.
Solo
Solo hikers have over 1,600 kilometres of trail to themselves, from gentle lakeside walks to multi-day backcountry routes into the remote Skoki Valley.
Couple
Canoe on turquoise water, soak in hot springs with mountain views, dine in Banff's elevated restaurant scene — the Rockies at their most romantic.
Friends
Skiing at Sunshine Village, hiking to Lake Agnes Teahouse, mountain biking the Legacy Trail — Banff delivers group adventure at every fitness level.
Family
The gondola, the hot springs, the lakeside walks, and the near-guaranteed elk sightings give families a greatest-hits mountain experience that works for all ages.
- Lake Minnewanka, Moraine Lake, and Lake Louise all sit within an hour's drive — three of the world's most photogenic lakes.
- Elk wander through the town centre at dusk, utterly unbothered by pedestrians on Banff Avenue.
- The Banff Upper Hot Springs sit at 1,585 metres, steaming in the open air with mountain views in every direction.
- Gondola rides to Sulphur Mountain summit offer a 360-degree panorama of six mountain ranges.
Bison short ribs braised in Alberta ale at the Elk & Oarsman, snow piling against the window.
Maple-glazed elk at the Fairmont Banff Springs — fine dining inside a castle in the Rockies.
Hot chocolate thick enough to coat a spoon at Wild Flour Bakery after a dawn hike.
Cairngorms
Scotland
Britain's only free-ranging reindeer herd grazes a sub-arctic plateau where blizzards arrive in June.
Blue Mountains
Australia
Eucalyptus haze turns a labyrinth of canyons and waterfalls into a blue hallucination.
Skardu
Pakistan
Sand dunes and glacial lakes sharing the same valley floor beneath Karakoram granite walls.
Lamington National Park
Australia
Hand-feed crimson rosellas in a cloud forest canopy where Antarctic beech trees survived the ice ages.
Pacific Rim National Park Reserve
Canada
Storm-watching from a cabin as twenty-metre waves detonate against ancient sea stacks.
Fathom Five National Marine Park
Canada
Glass-bottomed boats glide over shipwrecks visible through Georgian Bay water clear as the Caribbean.
Twillingate
Canada
Apartment-sized icebergs drift into a harbour where locals harvest them for vodka.
Tadoussac
Canada
Belugas surface beside your kayak where the Saguenay Fjord meets the St Lawrence.