Sunshine Gondola
The newer Sunshine Gondola , 18km southwest of town, once whisked you 4km from the Sunshine car park in the Bourgeau Valley to the Sunshine Village Resort at 2215m and some staggering views. At no extra cost, the Standish Chairlift led on from the resort to the Continental Divide (2430m) and a post marking the BC-Alberta border, but at the time of writing both have been completely closed for the summer (hours in the past, should it reopen, were July & Aug Mon-Thurs 8.30am-7.30pm, Fri-Sun 8.30am-10.30pm; $12). At present White Mountain Adventures run a shuttle bus (with optional day and half-day guided walks) from Banff to the Sunshine car park in place of the gondola (departs 8.45am, returns 3pm & 5pm; $35 plus $10 for guided walk) and four shuttles from here upwards (9.30am, 10.30am, 11.30am and 1.30pm, returns 1pm, 2pm, 3pm, 4pm & 5pm; $18 including walk): numbers are limited so you should book a place on the bus (tel 678-4099 or 1-800/408-005, www.canadiannatureguides.com ). Two connecting gravel trails can be followed once you're up the mountain through Sunshine Meadows , a beautiful and unusually large tract of alpine grassland. The Rock Isle Trail loop starts at the Sunshine Meadows Nature Centre. After 1km, branch right to pass Rock Isle Lake on the left (take the left fork and you'd eventually come to Lake Assiniboine). Around 600m after the branch right you come to a fork: turn left and you loop around the Garden Path Trail (3.8km) past Larix Lake, the Simpson Viewpoint and Grizzly Lake back to the fork. From here it's 500m to a 1.2-kilometre detour to the right to Standish Viewpoint (a dead end). Otherwise head straight on and after 2.8km you come to a junction and the Monarch Viewpoint, where a 1.6-kilometre walk takes you back to the Nature Centre (11.5km total with all loops and detours). Ask for a sketch map of this area from the information centre.
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