Canada
Banff
Canada's first national park began as a bathhouse, and you can still take the waters.
Cascade Mountain closes the end of the main street like a stage flat. Steam rises off the springs while gondola cars climb the shoulder above town.
Canada's first national park built its town where hot water met scenery, and both still work. Gondola ridges, canyon walks and lake roads fan out from a centre dense with kitchens and history. The bathhouse origins remain on offer: soak where the park began.
Solo
Gondola ridges, springs and town kitchens sequence a full solo day without a car.
Couple
Summit, soak and a Banff Avenue evening: the park's founding rhythm for two.
Friends
Groups can split trails by energy and reunite over fondue at the town's institutions.
Family
The gondola, springs and interpretive walks carry children through big scenery gently.
- Canada's first national park still runs on its founding pairing of hot water and scenery.
- Gondola ridges, canyon walks and lake roads fan from a walkable town.
- The springs that started everything remain open for the soak.
The Grizzly House has run fondue and Canadian game, bison and elk among it, since 1967.
Wild Flour bakes the town's mornings fresh in the centre of Banff Avenue.
Cairngorms
Scotland
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Blue Mountains
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Skardu
Pakistan
Sand dunes and glacial lakes sharing the same valley floor beneath Karakoram granite walls.
Lamington National Park
Australia
Antarctic beech trunks rise through cloud forest where waterfalls vanish into green ravines.
Pacific Rim National Park Reserve
Canada
Cold surf, cedar rainforest and kilometres of open sand line Vancouver Island's exposed shore.
Fathom Five National Marine Park
Canada
Shipwrecks show through Georgian Bay water clear enough to read their decks from the surface.
Twillingate
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Iceberg Alley delivers its giants past cliff paths, lighthouses and harbour villages.
Tadoussac
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Whales feed where the cold Saguenay meets the St Lawrence beneath a village of red roofs.