What to do in Jasper, Canada
There’s a level of laidback friendliness in this Canadian ski town that you won’t find in Whistler or Banff.
One of many lessons to be learned from the pandemic has been not to underestimate the value of human company. There’s pleasure to be found in conversations struck up with strangers, meeting new people, forming fresh friendships, especially when travelling. And so, deprived of such opportunities for weeks on end in 2021, I find myself reminiscing about a trip to Canada before Covid became part of the lexicon.
I’m clumping down the main street in heavy boots on my second day in Jasper, that most snowglobe-pretty of Canadian mountain towns, when I pass the restaurant where I ate the night before, Harvest Food + Drink. The owner, who’s standing in the doorway watching folk go about their business, calls out a greeting. He introduces himself as Sean Walker and we shoot the breeze. I tell him I loved his bison meatballs and bacon brussels sprouts; he tells me how he used to run a Canadian restaurant in Sydney – and then I continue on my way. A few blocks down I run into another acquaintance from earlier that morning who’s out walking his husky. By the end of my five-day trip it seems I know half the town. I’m on stop-and-chat terms with Chris, who plays guitar at the bar at the Fairmont Resort on weekends, Estelle, who runs food tours, and cab driver Steve. It’s all so very convivial.
Originally a 19th-century trading post for fur trappers, Jasper sits beside the Athabasca River inside the 11,228km sq of pristine mountain wilderness that is the World Heritage-listed Jasper National Park, the largest national park in the Canadian Rockies. The town, a cluster of pitched roofs surrounded by a halo of snowy, pine-flecked peaks is home to fewer than 5000 people in the off-season, swelling to 12,000 in summer, making it more intimate than bigger-name Canadian ski resorts. “Whistler and Banff are ski towns on steroids,” the aforementioned cab driver Steve tells me on one of our short trips between Fairmont Park Lodge, where I’m staying, into town. “In Jasper, we’re smaller. We’re friendlier. You can be chatting to someone over a beer at the Legion [bar] on a Friday night, and the next thing they’ll be inviting you to join them on a hike tomorrow.”
Hiking, or getting outdoors and close to nature, is as essential to the people of Jasper as breathing. Most of them will tell you the best time to visit is summer, when the meadows are awash with wildflowers, rivers and lakes fill with kayakers and stand-up paddleboarders, and the whole town clocks off early most days to swing a rucksack over their shoulders. But I’m here in January, shortly after the Christmas crowds have left, and everything’s hushed, cosy and slow. It feels like I’ve discovered Jasper’s secret season.
I begin most mornings doing like the Canadians do and racing outdoors as early as practicable; usually with a walk around the frozen Lac Beauvert, which sits just outside the luxury wooden cabin of my Lake View Suite at the Fairmont. The clear blue skies blur with pink and mauve streaks as the sun rises behind the lodge. Lone elk regard me with heavy-lidded indifference as they chew their cud (I’m careful to keep a safe distance; surprisingly, it’s not bears or wolves that pose the greatest danger to humans in the Rockies, but bad-tempered elk). Occasional ice skaters swish gracefully along the lake’s edges, and woodpeckers busy themselves obliterating the trunks of lodgepole pines. Everything is crisp and fresh and almost completely silent.
I spend only one morning on the slopes of Marmot Basin, the ski spot 20 minutes out of town, because there’s too much else to do. One morning is devoted to an icewalk tour into the limestone depths of Maligne Canyon, a dramatic gorge carved by underground streams. I’m picked up from the Fairmont by guide Dave, from SunDog Tour Co, and we pass herds of elk and deer as we make our way to the gorge, the deepest in the Rockies.
Dave issues everyone in our small group – there are just two others, another benefit of staying out-of-season – with helmets and ice cleats to fit to our boots and we begin the 3.5km mostly downhill walk across six bridges into the canyon’s 50m depths. We’re unable to make it to the lowest point as a spate of unseasonably warm-ish weather has melted the river at the canyon’s base but we are still able to gaze up at the cathedral walls and spiky icicles of frozen waterfalls that cascade from the top.
On a clear, chilly evening I join a tour at the Jasper Planetarium, a white domed theatre in the grounds of the Fairmont. I’m entranced by the lively presentation that details the innate beauty of the night sky and its importance to every culture on Earth, including the First Nations people of Canada who used the constellations to illustrate many of their creation myths. Jasper sits inside the second-largest Dark Sky Preserve in the world, thanks in no small part to the town’s commitment to reducing its own light pollution via low-glow streetlamps and other initiatives.
Another day I join Jasper Food Tours to sample the town’s cuisine. These kinds of outings don’t always feel authentic, eschewing local hangouts in favour of shiny tourist venues. Happily, Jasper doesn’t do “tourist-shiny”. Each restaurant we visit feels like the real Jasper deal. There’s elk meatloaf and Yukon mashed potatoes washed down with coriander-scented “Jasper The Bear” ale at Jasper Brewing Co, which opened in 2005 after local kid Socrates Korogonas won the lottery (literally) and decided to open a brewpub. We also tear at sticky barbecue beef ribs next to a plate of poutine and a glass of Okanagan Valley shiraz cabernet at rowdy local sports bar De’d Dog.
Guide Estelle has made sure we arrive at the latter during a brief lull in business so we don’t take a regular’s spot. “When you come here at busy times everyone’s seated in the same places,” Estelle explains. Even locals who have long left the Earth join their mates for a beer or a shot; the walls are covered in photographs of deceased townsfolk and Estelle tells us many family members make regular visits to share a glass with their dearly departed.
I catch the shuttle from Fairmont into town for the annual Jasper in January street party. I have visions of chisel-jawed frat boys and sorority girls guffawing loudly as they throw back schnapps shooters after a day of gnarly powder runs on their snowboards. “Don’t forget to wear your best ’80s snow gear for our fancy dress competition!” reads the party flyer, cementing my certainty that I’ll be the lone person over 35 and the only one who won’t be staying up past 10pm for the DJs.
In fact, the street party is a wholesome tableau of family-friendly Canadian mountain activity. Children toast s’mores over a bonfire. Couples hold hands as they cool sticks of molten maple syrup taffy in the snow, and families queue to try their hand at that most puzzling of Canadian sports, curling.
It’s dreamy-pretty and comforting and it feels just a bit like home.
In the know
Jasper is 370km west of Edmonton and 400km northwest of Calgary. SunDog Tour Co runs daily shuttles to and from Edmonton airport. VIA Rail runs a sleeper service between Vancouver and Jasper on trains fitted with glass-domed roofs to maximise views. Prices at Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge vary according to the seasons; rooms from $C399 ($438) a night next January.
Travellers to Canada are required to be double vaccinated and must provide necessary documentation (proof of vaccination and travel information) via the ArriveCAN app or website within 72 hours of arrival.
Alexandra Carlton was a guest of Destination Canada.