Banff

Banff is the mountain town at the heart of Banff National Park, Canada's oldest, set high in the Canadian Rockies amid a landscape of turquoise lakes, glaciers and enormous forested peaks. It is a proper resort town — bustling Banff Avenue, hot springs, grand hotels — but everything about it is dwarfed by the scale of the mountains: this is big, wild, bear-country wilderness on a scale Europe cannot match.

The outdoor menu is vast. Winter brings world-class skiing at the "Big 3" resorts — Lake Louise, Sunshine Village and Norquay — plus ice walks and Nordic trails. Summer opens a lifetime of hiking, from lakeshore strolls at Lake Louise and Moraine Lake to serious backcountry days, with the wider Icefields Parkway and Jasper beyond. Wildlife is everywhere, and genuine — this is grizzly and elk country, so it comes with a wilder edge than the Alps.

As a national-park town, Banff is protected and relatively compact, and while it is not cheap by North American standards, it offers arguably the best value of the "world-class" basecamps for the sheer scale of wilderness on offer. Calgary's international airport is a straightforward drive away.

Winter (December to April) for skiing the Big 3 resorts and frozen-lake magic. Summer (June to September) for hiking, when the trails are clear of snow and the lakes turn their famous turquoise. September brings golden larches and fewer crowds. Spring and late autumn are quiet shoulder seasons with variable conditions. Carry bear awareness (and spray) on the trails.

Banff is about an hour and a half by road from Calgary International Airport along the Trans-Canada Highway — an easy, spectacular drive. Shuttle buses run frequently from the airport. A car gives the most freedom for the Icefields Parkway and further trailheads, though the town and nearby sights are well served by local transit in season.