Canada... are tours worth it?

[Bea]

Hoping to go to the rockies this summer.... there are a zillion tours... been looking at the Glacier adventure one...

For those in the know and much more savvy then me?...

are these tours worth it? ... do they provide something different ? or should you just plan your own...?

will deffo be taking in whale tours when we're in vancouver and vancouver island but just wondering about the others...

We've always done out own thing when on holidays but since this is the big trip... i'm trying to figure out how do we get the most out of our holidays...

Thanks all!

I cannot quite see how you can do the glacier tour yourself if you don’t have the vehicles they use.

We have seen numerous glaciers and calving into the ocean is great but you won’t get that unless you are at the coast. If this is a special holiday and you are not going back in a hurry, I would do it.

Any whale watching tour is amazing. You should also try and see bears! If you are there in the summer the bears should be active. Check out where you need to go to see them. This would be a worthwhile trip too in my opinion. Helicopter trips were silly prices when we were there so we didn’t do them.

You can't get up on the glacier without the tour - we did the basic one and that's plenty plus lots of google for other things to see inthe area

Yep! Thought so! Thanks for replies! X

We only did the tours that you couldn't really do by yourself. The glacier walk Icewalks was a great experience and enabled a much closer experience than the brief bus tour most people do. On Vancouver Island we went on a bear-watching boat trip, which was fun. We booked both of those months in advance, and also pre-booked white water rafting.

Another thing that worked really well was an audio guide for the Icefields Parkway this. Because it uses satnav technology it knows where you are and provides the appropriate commentary. It recommended the must-sees on the drive as well as mentioning other sites should you want a longer experience. It kept the children engaged during the drive (there was a limit to how many mountains and lakes they were interested in). We also downloaded the guide for Jasper, but that was less good I thought.

Thanks Azure! Will keep in mind! X