Modesto

We set the alarm for 5am as we wanted to be on the road by about 5:30am so we would arrive at the airport by about 9am. I quickly packed up my bag and thankfully most of my clothes had dried that night so they were ready to pack. Scott made us coffee, and the drip coffee was awful with no flavour.

We were on the road by about 5:40am, with an expected arrival at the Car Rental Drop Off area at 9am. On the way we decided we would pull over to get a coffee from Starbucks. I found a town called Modesto that was about halfway. As we started turning off the highway into the town people were walking along the highway and sleeping. As we entered the town it looked very baron. I googled the turn and it said it had one of the highest crime rates in California. We still decided to stop but thought we should be quick. We grabbed our coffee and quickly ate breakfast in the car.

We continued on the freeway and we both thought the coffee was awful. I couldn’t drink mine. We crossed over a few bridges and could see the bay and San Francisco. We arrived at the car rental drop off at 9:15am, and there was a line of cars being dropped off. They said to just leave the keys in the car and would send the receipt. I asked for a printed copy for our records to ensure they didn’t charge us any extra.

We then went up the stairs and hopped on the AirTrain to the international terminal. We found WestJet and checked in, before walking through Duty Free and looking at the different items they had. We bought some popcorn and veggies and hummus for an early lunch as our flight departed at 12:50pm. We relaxed by the gate before boarding the flight.

I was on the window seat and we could see the mountains as we came closer to Calgary. Not long into the flight, Scott and I could smell a sweet peach smell. I thought someone had a lip gloss in front of us, and then we realised the guy next to Scott was vaping! Scott asked him to stop and he then went to the bathroom to do it.

The flight was 2.5 hours and we arrived in Calgary at 4:30. We went through customs and collected our bags before finding the Car Rental place. There was no queue so it was quite easy to get the car. This time we were given a Jeep Compass which was slightly smaller than the RAV4.

We left the airport and it was 1 hour and 15 minutes to get to Banff. We stopped off at a Walmart on the way and grabbed some supplies for the next week. We had a kitchenette at the place in Banff so we bought some items we could cook. The drive was quite beautiful with mountains in the distance. We arrived in the National Park and paid the feee for the week, and the ranger suggested we go to Larch Valley which is really beautiful this time of year.

After a long day we finally arrived at the accommodation at 8:30pm. We checked in and had a salad with chicken for dinner, before falling asleep by 9:30pm.Read more