It happened- We had a big night out in Banff. We visited a few watering holes…including a hostel bar where they served up tasty Jagerbombs. We may have even missed the last bus out of town and ended up walking home in the rain. Needless to say, we desperately needed the Upper Banff Hot Springs the next day!

Visiting Banff Hot Springs

The Upper Banff Hot Springs were one of those points of interest that would have been easy to skip over in a National Park as incredible as Banff. With so many other things that needed doing and hikes that needed hiking, what’s the big deal about Banff hot springs?

Upper Banff is commercially developed and thus, is more akin to visiting a really hot swimming pool than running off into the woods into a muddy all natural hot spring. After so many “rustic” spring experiences the cleanliness of it all was not at all unwelcome. The water still smells like sulphur though so bring a swimsuit that you don’t mind trashing a bit. We had to soak ours in a bucket of water with an entire package of baking soda in it to get rid of the smell.

How much does it cost?

Upper Banff Hot Springs cost about $8 and you can even rent a sick vintage suit for an additional $2. The vintage suits “hug” a bit for guys so it was an option that I decided to skip out on.

Other information

We also explain a bit about the Lake Minnewanka loop in this video. The loop became a place of refuge for us- it had awesome cell signal for work and it was relatively quiet, even when the rest of the park was packed. It was also a place where Pepper could play in the streams without fear of becoming a snack for brown bears. Bear Aware.