frankieforehead

Calaway Park.....ha ha ha ha ha he he he...No I wouldn't go and spend some of your expensive break there...it will be like going to one of those fairs that visit small towns once a year...You'll see what I mean when you drive past it on the way to Banff....don't blink though or you'll miss it.....However that said and done, if your little one is really young then it will be okay for him/her.

The Zoo, yup worth a visit....if your going up to Jasper, then you may as well hang a right and visit West Edmonton Mall...the fun fair in there is a lot better, and plus there is a mega waterslide park etc...and good day out.

I haven't read the rest of the posts but someone will have said visit the down town part of Calgary and take in the Tower, there are some nice parks, oh and of course you can shop and eat loads.

Enjoy your visit, and don't forget to visit McKays in Cochrane

offwego

Don't think anyone has mentioned the science museum. It is great there for little kids, and if you are staying in Calgary you can get the LRT to it free of charge.

Steve_P

The LRT in Calgary is only free in the downtown core.

If you are coming from the south, northeast or northwest then regular fares will apply.

My understanding is the OP is going to be staying in the northeast at the Sheraton Cavalier, 32 ave and Barlow trail.

Cheers
Steve

R2D2

Thats a pretty Lonnnnnnngggggg right ! About 3.5 to 4 hrs journey. You'd need to work an overnight stay in there somewhere i would have thought........but YES, West Edm Mall is quite a good day out for the kids, (esp on a wet day) although I feel Edmonton has better options.

Alberta_Rose

I suppose it depends how competent they are ..... my boys were still using stabilisers at that age (much to their embarassment ... )
Here's a link to the COP web-site for more info...

http://www.canadaolympicpark.ca/winter2005/

CalgaryBlade

Agreed, we get annual passes but that's because it's a 20 min drive and the kids (10 and 7) enjoy an afternoon there.

However, it's not a patch on "Canada's Wonderland" (about 1 hour north of Toronto).

But even though our kids get to visit Wonderland once a year, they still won't turn down a trip to Calaway Park.

mushroom

Thanks so much to everyone who responded, your kindness is much appreciated. Isn't it amazing that Judy in particular takes time to make phone calls to help people. Take a bow

I'm sure it'll be the trip of a lifetime and I can't wait, and Jo good luck to you for your trip - we're in Calgary 26-29 May if you fancy getting together to share Calgary experiences!

Not sure if I'm allowed to do this but I put pictures of trips I've been on on the following link if anyone is interested. My way of giving a little something back.

http://blogs.bootsnall.com/Martin+Reilly

Thanks again

M

joelsa

That would've been nice, unfortunately we are in Calgary from 29th Apr to 12th May and then we head over to Vancouver for a week.

Next time maybe.

Jo xx

CWEMM02

Why not look at Zoom and fly to Toronto and then to St. John's? I have seen some great deals on Zoom.

Karate Kev

Hi Mushroom,

I know this advice may be arriving "after the horse bolted", but when we went over for our recce last May (then again at Christmas), we flew with Air Transat, and we sorted our flights thru globespan.com. The up-side is that they're about the cheapest you'll get - the down-side is that in the plane its a bit like sardines!! It cost us (myself, the missus, and our 2 kids) £1087 inclusive of airport taxes - but we had to pick a time before the prices soared due to school hols.
Also, in order to keep the prices right down, we actually did a house-swap, which was excellent! We had the use of their house & car for 2 weeks, and vice-versa. (We did this thru homebasehols.com)
Hope this advice isn't too late, but if it is, accept my apologies.

Kev.

Addy

I did the two weeks in an RV last September, from Calgary - Vancouver -Calgary (3000kms) driving about 4 - 5 hours a day, depending on where we wanted to get to.

Flew with Zoom direct from Manchester to Calgary (£1100 in the premium seats) good flight and only a 9 hours, £1200 for the two weeks in the RV, plus spends, fuel etc, came to about £3500 for the two of us and the wife loves her shopping (Wife ended up telling some lady in a clothes shop about Coronation Street for an hour in one place in Vancouver, unreal or what? )

Our trip we sort of ad-libbed from travel guides, there is a brilliant AA guide for Vancouver and the Rockies, that we bought out of WHSmith, that was our bible during our visit.

If you're in Calgary and visit the tower, the Glenbow Museum is across the road and i spent an easy afternoon in there, and me and the wife are not really museum people, but i found it very interesting, well recommended, what wasn't so good was the fact that some low life put a bumper mark down the side of the RV and buggered off, but s'pose that could happen anywhere really.

Went over to Banff and stayed at tunnel top RV park, absolutly fantastic, i think the thing that got me about driving from Calgary to Banff, was the Rockies looming ever closer and closer, awesome. Loved Banff and took me an hour to convince Jo to go to the top of Sulphur mountain on the cable car, but i was adamant, i wasn't coming all this way, just to look at it, i wanted to get up there, and she reluctantly agreed.

Then up to Lake Louise and Lake Moraine.

The columbia icefield was an highlight for me, walking to the glacier wasn't tho, i was knackered, i put it down to the altitutude, rather than my fitness , Jo, my wife stayed in the van and made tea and butties for my return from the expedition!!!, bloody well needed it after that, but the drive along the icefields parkway, is one i will never forget.

Stayed in Jasper and really liked that place too and then drove up to Mt. Robson and then sort of worked our way down to Van, stopped off at a brilliant little RV park in a place called Clearwater, it was so peaceful and relaxing that i wanted to stay for another day, but we had to move on cos we weren't sure of our schedule.

Spent a few days in Van area, one place we stayed which was nice was Ft.Langley, it was an RV park on a small islet and surrounded by the river on both sides, beautiful.


Also stayed in centre of Van at the Capilano RV park, which is very close to Stanley Park, spent a day, just walking around and watching the ships sail in and out of port, whilst in Van i went over to Surrey / Langley and visited the headquarters of a company i used to work for in the UK (Finning - Cat eathmoving dealers) and cheekily asked them about work, but the guys there made me a coffee and we chatted for 30 mins about work possiblities, which they were quite positive about, just needed to come home and work out my next move now.

WE gradually worked our way back to Calgary, via Osoyoos (nice stop over by the lake) then through Nelson (yeah, i know, i got lost on that bit) and the nalong the US border back to Banff, for a night again and then into Calgary for another stop over before our return home the following day.

I'd really love to make the move out there, but i don't know if i could be bothered with the 39 month wait to get the OK, just seems a tad inefficent to me, to take so long to process an application, whilst all the time getting older, i'm 37 now and if it takes 3.5 years to process things, i'll be nearly 41, by time it's thru, i seem to feel as tho i've left it 5 years too late, but we'll see.

I now i've gone on, but Canada has that effect on you, you just can't shut up telling folk about it.

Piff Poff

You know, our 1st trip out here was very much like that and we just knew we wanted to be here. Now on a clear day the mountains loom at us and we can be there in a couple of hours, it's well worth the hassle of the paperwork if your that way inclined. Your about the same age as myself (35)and hubby (41) and we are really pleased we went for it. Can't decide on a tent ot RV for all the summer weekends in the moutains tho'

R2D2

Hi
We have just bought our first ever tent. I think I'm up for it (yikes)
Never camped before. Hub has and he's determined our boys should experience it, so thats enough persuasion for me. And where better to experience the great outdoors than Canada.
First go is the back garden........................then we may venture down to Devon River Valley where they have a beautiful campground...............after that its the real thing in the Rockies (too far to just nip home if the bugs start biting (double yikes)
If the RV tickles your fancy, we highly recommend it. We did it with a 2 yr old back in 2002 and it was a great way to go with a small child. We would do it again.
All last year we had 5 weekends in the Mountains and stayed in B & B's and Inn's, none of which broke the bank.
Its just so fabulous that you can do it whenever................... I'm starting to really love it here !!!!

Alberta_Rose

Phah! Lightweight!

Hubby (56 today) and me (46 last month) just came out here last September, and it still feels like the best and most exciting decision of our lives. We hope we'll have many more years ahead of us, we're not dead yet anyway ... and the future looks rosy for our two boys, aged 19 and 14!

Piff Poff

Yeah! I really like the idea of a tent (used to go camping growing up) but my hubby is a bit of a petrol head so anything with 4 wheels and an engine........Used to restrict himself to muscle cars - going to an auction tomorrow (apparently I need an Expedition - my explorer isn't big enough!) that will have older campers in the price range of tents so god only knows what we'll come back with when the bit of paper starts flapping. Good job I love 'im!

Oh! we did a last minute trip to mountains with stepson who refused to stay in a tent, so not many Inns with room left as it was last minute - 2 nights accommodation topped $600 - we could have had luxury tents for that I am just looking forward to finishing work on Fridays and being in the mountains round a fire by late supper time.