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Audley in Canada and Alaska
6
Almost unimaginably large, Canada
stretches from the Pacific Ocean in the
west to the Atlantic Ocean in the east and
borders the Arctic Circle. It is a land of rugged
mountains and giant lakes, dense forests and
rolling prairies; home to bears, wolves and
herds of caribou that roam the great swathes
of northern wilderness tundra. Impossible to
see all in one trip, the following pages include
brief guides to the provinces and territories
that are designed to give you a flavour of
what there is to see and do in each.
Wild flowers in the Rockies
British Columbia
Gateway to the Pacific and Asia, British Columbia
is perhaps best known for its coast. A chain of
islands protects the Inside Passage where the
Coastal Mountains rear 2,000 metres above
spectacular fjords, calving icebergs into the sea
from countless glaciers in a dramatic and wild
landscape. These are some of the world’s greatest
whale-watching waters, rich in marine life of all
kinds. The city of Vancouver is beautifully set
amongst these mountains and is consistently
judged one of the world’s most liveable cities:
with an average age of 38 it is dynamic, exciting
and cosmopolitan. Head inland and BC shelters
some of Canada’s most beautiful and untouched
wilderness regions: it is one of North America’s
most mountainous areas and the interior is a
paradise for grizzly and black bears, moose, elk
and wolves. BC is rich in First Nations history;
along the temperate coastal regions totem poles
still attest to ancient civilisations.
Alberta
Banff National Park, Lake Louise and the Rocky
Mountains form the strongest images of Alberta, a
huge and thinly-populated province that stretches
from southern mountains and foothills and fades,
to the north, into vast forested plains. Once
home to Blackfoot, Cree, Gros Ventre and
Kootenay Indians, change came slowly to this
unspoiled region. It still has some of Canada’s
most important UNESCO Heritage Sites of First
Nations culture, including Head Smashed-in
Buffalo Jump and Writing-on-Stone Provincial
Park. The largest city is Calgary, an oil-rich highrise
settlement whose veneer of sophistication
falls away, each year, with the Calgary Stampede.
At this time it plays host to the year’s largest
rodeo and the cowboy culture rules supreme.
Saskatchewan & Manitoba
Canada’s prairie heartlands extend across
Saskatchewan and Manitoba, rolling wheat
landscapes, dotted with grain elevators, that
stretch endlessly into the distance. Few tour
operators feature this region but there are plenty
of reasons to visit. Its remote wilderness regions
were home to some of the great conflicts
between native peoples and settlers: the Big
Muddy Badlands were the resting place to which
Sitting Bull retreated after his battle with General