We have the in-laws coming over in 4 weeks, and we were thinking of going to Jasper (Banff, maybe) for a night or two camping.
Anyone know if it's possible to hire camping equipment? There's 6 of them coming over (5 adults, 1 10yr old) plus us 4, and none of us really have any equipment.

Not sure about hiring equipment but you might find it hard to get a space, Parks Canada launched a new website for booking their campsites and with 3 hours of launch all sites were fully booked for the entire season. You might get lucky but I'd ring round first and see if there are any cancellations.

I think you'll have difficulty renting sufficient equipment for so many people for such a short term. Very often neighbours, friends or workmates have equipment that you can borrow. Make sure if you go that you have tons of bug spray and bear spray, lol.

We tried camping this last week, not in the Rockies but a Lake. It was all fully booked and had been booked up one year in advance I thought Camping was all about getting on the open road and stoping off where ever. Like some other peole have said I would do some research and e-mail/phone campsites to save disappointment.

You can get cheap camping stuff from Canadian Tire or Walmart I was quite impressed with our tent.

Those days are long gone.

Yeah, I gathered that. It was a good job Mandy had loads of land

Did you try booking at Old Macdonalds??? I know that books up really quick, we met some friends there a couple of years ago for a bbq and they were booking spots for next year then For future reference Alix lake has a campground - it's tiny and you can book in advance but it's slightly unknown (or it was until now anyhoo).

One of the reasons we sold our RV was the hassle of trying to find somewhere to stay, we had visions of coming home from work on a Friday having packed up the day before and hitting the open road and camping for the weekend. After a couple of trips where we found something, eventually, after driving for hours we gave up on that dream and sold up

Its a shame that.

It just goes to show that our original dream of owning a campground would have more than likely have been profitable though

Your right on that one, do it. I'll be your first customer, I'll book now.

Oh, I loved Old Macdonalds... a bunch of friends and I took all the littlies there a few years back. I only had two then, and they were 2 and 10 months - their first experience of camping! (sigh) Hilarious - loads of women, grubby children, and tent-hopping.

I think we RVed out of season, just before all the sites closed... I remember it snowed in Jasper...

I had no idea it booked up so fast these days...

I had no idea it booked up so fast these days...

It's all those damn foreigners coming from cramped countries, lol.

How very dare they!