Smith Dorrian Trail - Spray Valley Provincial Park, Alberta

Last June, before our trip to Banff and Jasper National Parks, Jaki Good Miller and I decided to explore an area that we had never been to, namely Kananaskis County. This area south of Canmore is often referred to as little Banff and, based upon our visit, we totally agree. The trip from Canmore took us south and you can easily spend a full day as the road passes through Bow Valley Wildland Provincial Park, Spray Valley Provincial Park, and Peter Lougheed Provincial Park. This section of the road is known as the Smith Dorrian Trail and, for almost its full length, has gorgeous views of the Canadian Rockies, forests and tree, lakes and wildlife. One of the really nice things about the area is the lack of tourists. Banff and Jasper have become quite the tourist attractions and can often be full of people during the daylight hours. Along our trip, we saw a few visitors here and there but most of the day we had the scenery to ourselves.