We started our Labor Day weekend trip by taking the first flight out of San Diego to Calgary, Canada – changing planes in Denver dragging our luggage from gate 20 to gate 60.

After a long wait at the rental car desk – they didn’t have the car in our class that we reserved through Priceline, so instead of waiting another hour – I upgraded to a Hyundai Sonata (nice car, but it feels like various pieces were stolen from other brands. For example, the dashboard seems like it came straight out of a Mercedes). We drove quite a bit through the streets of Calgary before reaching the freeway that’ll take us to Banff National Park. It seemed like there’s a large Chinese population – we saw quite a few Chinese signs, looked a bit like Vancouver. Its a pretty hour and half drive to Banff from Calgary.

Starving, we decided to stop in Canmore – a town near the entrance to Banff. Many who visit Banff prefer to stay in Canmore because its less crowded and touristy than Banff. But there were still plenty of tourist roaming Main Street Canmore. Canmore didn’t become a tourist destination until the 1988 Winter Olympics, when it hosted some events.

We quickly found out that unlike Vancouver or Whistler, most places (Canmore or Banff) don’t accept US dollars and for some reason a few places were having problems with their credit card system.  So after a trip to the ATM machine, we were finally able to quench our hunger.