Portland, Seattle USA & West Canada

gfplux

Hello All,
In the past people have been very helpful so I hope you can help with this.
My wife and I have visited California, Florida, New York and Eastern Canada. We live in Luxembourg Europe
Our next trip planned is the Western side of Canada perhaps starting in Portland or Seattle then crossing the border in to Canada and heading to Vancouver. We intend to go in 2010 around September. Our 18 year old daughter may come with us. We would fly to the USA and fly out of Canada. The trip would be for around 15 days.
Has anyone any comments on this sort of trip. Is Portland being ambitious as the trip originally was only to Canada and I wanted to add Seattle. having looked at the map Portland does not look so far.
Sorry I forgot to post a link to our last trip to Canada.
http://boards.fool.co.uk/Message.asp?mid=10249761

torbrex

It all depends on how long you want to stay at each location.
I did a similar trip a couple of years ago minus the Portland visit and was able to go round the Olympic national park, do a whalewatching boat trip off Friday Harbour, visit with relatives in Vancouver. I then went East across country to Yellowstone national park via Grand Coulee Dam and back West through Twin Falls, Idaho towards Seattle. My planned trip to Mt. Rainer national park was washed out by torrential rain that lasted for the last 3 days of my trip.

gfplux

Thanks for the reply.
Having done more research, I am now looking further into:-

Fly in to Seattle and stay couple of days. Then rent a car (Good points about car drop off charges )and drive to Vancouver or could we take the ferry to Vancouver, does anyone have a link. Or take a train, can that be done?
Stay in Vancouver for 5 days (too long/short) and explore the area around.
Hire a car and set of for ? Whistler, Banff and spend a few days in one of the parks. Perhaps move on to Calgary and fly out from there (if possible) or I have heard of a Train called the Rocky Mountaineer?
I had not thought of using a ferry or the Train but they sound quite exciting but perhaps expensive!
Any further thoughts welcome.