Banff Winter 'Fests: Banff SnowDays & Lake Louise Ice Magic Festival

Sometimes (not often) winter is worth celebrating. Christmas. Snow days. Curling up by the fire while big, fluffy flakes drift slowly to the ground outside. These are all things I actually do enjoy about winter.

In Banff National Park in Alberta, Canada, parks personnel take celebrating winter to a whole new level. 

When I gifted my husband a trip to the mountains for his Christmas present this year, we were lucky enough to arrive on the same weekend that both the Banff SnowDays festival AND the Lake Louise Ice Magic Festival were happening. It made the weekend that much more full of interesting and beautiful sights, beyond the usual majesty of a winter mountain vacation.

Skate and Sleigh on Alberta's Frozen Lake Louise

Skating on a frozen lake can be an enjoyable experience.

But skating on frozen Lake Louise in Alberta's majestic Rocky Mountains is even better. With the incredible backdrop of Mount Fairview, Mount Whyte, and the Victoria Glacier surrounding you, gliding across the exceptionally blue ice is an unforgettable adventure.

Combine your skating activity with a sleigh ride around the snow-covered banks of Lake Louise, and you have created a perfect scenic winter day in the mountains. This is exactly what we did in January of 2018 when I took my husband and kids to Banff National Park as a Christmas-gift-experience. If an outdoors adventure of this nature appeals to you, then read on for more details on how you can organize your own winter getaway!

Incredible Ice Castles of Edmonton, Alberta

"When it snows, you have two choices: shovel or make snow angels." (Anonymous)

OR.... Or you could make awe-inspiring, jaw-dropping, majestic ice castles complete with towers, slides, and caves.

Well, if you are Edmonton, Alberta, that's what you would do. (More accurately, that's what they DID!) And last weekend, we went to explore this Narnia-esque wonder as a family.

I had been seeing advertisements about the Edmonton Ice Castle over and over again on Facebook. (Facebook must know how travel-obsessed I am.) I had been hinting repeatedly to my husband that we just had to go see it, and for about three weekends in a row we had made plans, and then everything would fall through. Last weekend, I announced that I was going no matter what.

Winter Tips for the Johnston Canyon Ice Walk

About thirty minutes west of Banff, Alberta is the amazing Johnston Canyon. Nestled in a valley in the Canadian Rocky Mountains, this canyon is impressive in both summer and winter. The seemingly innocuous Johnston Creek is responsible for the canyon's design, cutting through the limestone walls over millennia to form sheer cliff walls, smooth water-rounded corners, deep pools, and even a waterfall or two..

I have written about Johnston Canyon in the past, as we have hiked it several times during the summer months. I even have photos of myself as a child, feeding chipmunks and hanging from branches as my family and I hiked up to the falls. Now it is my turn to take photos of my own children doing the same!

However, despite being very familiar with the canyon, I had never hiked it during the winter. So for Christmas this year, I gifted my husband a weekend family trip away to Banff, where we'd visit Johnston Canyon and do the 'Ice Walk'.

How to Build a Quinzee: Winter Fun in the Snow

Who here likes winter?

Typically not me. I am a warm, summer breeze kind of girl who likes to lay on the beach or dig in her garden or go for a hikes through green forests. I am not a girl who likes frozen toes and runny noses and cars that don't start because it is minus 40 degrees outside. 

But since I am Canadian, and we Canadians get winter for 3/4 of the year (at least, it seems that way) every year I try to make the most of winter and look for fun winter adventures to pass the long, chilly months away.

About six years ago I wrote a post about some of the activities available to those intrepid people who choose to celebrate the winter weather, and in that post I mentioned building a quinzee.

J.J. Collett Natural Area: Central Alberta's Wilderness Park

The area where I live, near Lacombe, Alberta is part of beautiful central Alberta. Our region is dominated in the summer by lush rolling hills, golden fields of canola or wheat, and patches of thick deciduous and coniferous trees dotting the landscape. It is serenely beautiful for a farming area. In the winter, our fields fill with blankets of white snow, while the green needles of the pine trees give colour to the land.

The area is not what I would call wild, although it is pretty. The many farms and fields ensure that wherever you go, you know civilization is close at hand.

Hiking Maligne Canyon in Alberta

I always have a hard time shopping for presents for my husband. He is the kind of guy that when he needs something, he simply goes and gets it and puts whatever item he has bought to practical use. He doesn't even like receiving presents. So gift-giving is tricky with that man. Especially gift-giving for his birthday, which comes so close after Christmas.

Go Snowshoeing in Jasper National Park in Canada

Item number 57 on my bucket list has been "Go snowshoeing" for years. Despite living in rural Alberta my whole life, where it is winter three-quarters of the year and always full of snow, I have never even stood in snowshoes before. It was actually a little sad that I had never checked item 57 off my list yet.

Dog Sledding in the Canadian Rockies

For my husband's 35th birthday, I was out of gift ideas. We are planning for baby #2 (already - who knew we were so fertile!) and so have been downsizing and minimizing like crazy to make room for a second nursery. Peanut is only 13 months, so the two babes will be 18 months apart, and that means lots of baby items, toys, and messes. My office has now completely disappeared, and my husband's office now doubles as a spare room. Boxes of books, trinkets, clothes, and much more have been carted out our front door to various destinations, just as long as they are not in our house.

Backyard Bucket List: Alberta's Winter Wonderland

Sometimes I forget that I live in the middle of beauty. Either I take it for granted, or I find myself cursing the fact that I live in rural Alberta during the wintertime. Truly, I am not a fan of winter. I don't like driving on treacherous icy roads, I don't like having to use my blow dryer to defrost the sliding door to the deck, and I don't like having to scrape the ice off my car windows after a long day of teaching in class. And that's just a preliminary list of things that I don't like about winter!