Lake Louise & Lake Moraine
Lake Louise is a very popular destination in Banff and a must see place when visiting Banff National park. There are many places in Banff & Jasper that are claimed to be world famous but Lake Louise & Moraine for sure is !.
You will be experiencing the most beautiful turquoise Lake Louise and you will definitely fall in love with the color. The famous Fairmont Chateau hotel is located at the brim of this lake and one of the famous attraction as well.
The Lakeshore trail starts in front of the Hotel and is a very easy flat trail where you can enjoy the trail watching the beautiful views of the water and the glacier.
The trail is ~4 Km roundtrip and allow at least 1 to 1.5 hours leaving room to take plenty of photos if you have the passion towards photography. This is one of the most popular trail and you will see lots of crowd in this trail walk.
Moraine Lake
Moraine Lake is smaller than Lake Louise, but the views are even more scenic. This might be due to the views from the top of the rocky mountain pile. It’s a glacier-fed lake situated in the beautiful Valley Of The Ten Peaks in Banff National Park.
There is a Rockpile very close to the lake. This is a short trail that takes less than 30 minutes to climb up the Rockpile mountain. The elevation gain is around 100 foot and highly recommend to climb this rockpile.It actually takes you along the moraine and offers breathtaking views overlooking the lake. As you climb up, you will spot lots of squirrels and birds and especially watch out for squirrels everywhere.
There are canoe docks available in Lake Moraine and was little expensive given that it’s one of the main tourist attraction. It costs 50$ for one hour of canoeing at the lake. The kids had an awesome time canoeing in Moraine lake. Canoe options are available in all of the lakes but for the scenic views my personal recommendation would be to do canoe or kayak in Lake Louise or Lake Moraine.
General Information
1. Parking – Both these lakes are extremely crowded and overflowing that you’ll see many cars on the main roads several miles away from the lake. Lake Moraine is more crowded than Lake Louise and there were plenty of parking space available in Lake Louise when compared to Moraine. If you are planning both these lakes in one day, visit Moraine first early in the morning and plan for an afternoon hike at Lake Louise
2. Food Options – Both the lakes have a café/restaurant at their locations but high priced. There are picnic tables available, so packed lunch does help in several ways avoiding the long lines and eating your favorite home made good.
3.Other famous Trails :- Lake Louise offers some good trails that we did not visit as we had seniors and children in our group who could not hike those trails.
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