Fly drive to Canada + Grand Canyon

dwhl

Hi there,

I wonder whether anyone could help me..

I am planning with my father to goto West Canada for a fly drive around the Rockies and then if possible goto see the Grand Canyon afterwards. I have holidays between 27/05/06 and 17/06/06. I am not sure what is the best way to go about it though.

My current plan is something like this:

Manchester to Calgary via canadian affair

Flydrive 12nights 13 days eg http://www.canadianaffair.com/en/self_drive_tours/west_coast/great_outdoors.asp to Vancouver

Vancouver fly to Las Vegas or Los Angeles and then do the Grand Canyon

I'm not sure whether it is better to goto LA or Las Vegas for the Grand Canyon......

I'm planning to come back to Manchester thereafter. It seems cheaper to fly back to Vancouver again before flying home...

My questions are
1. What do people think of the flydrive in Canada? Is it worthwhile?
2. What is the best way to incrporate the Grand Canyon?
3. Should I goto Las Vegas or Los Angeles for this?
4. How much is the Grand Canyon trip going to cost?
4. Should I fly back from Canada or the US?
5. Does anyone have any suggestions as to what else I could do?

I know that I'm leaving it late to book but please can someone help me.... thank you so much

David

Charlton_Taz

Hi!

I did something like this in September 2005. I used Canadian affair to fly to Vancouver...then I did less driving than you want to...I just went up to Whistler for a bit of hiking, biking type stuff. Though from friends who have been to Canada and had more time I have been told doing the drive through the rockies from Calgary to Vancouver is beautiful...so do it!

I also spend three days in Vancouver itself which was nice, and it is a lovely city...I would say three days is enough to cover all the sites there though...like Grouse Mountain, Stanley Park and we went up this big tower for great views too.

I then went on to Las Vegas from Vancouver airport. Flew with American West (though I think they've now been merged with United airlines). Its a direct flight and took about 3 hours. Good thing too is that you can clear the US customs at Vancouver airport so you don't need to join the huge queues at the other end. I also loved Las Vegas....quite a contrast from the mountains in Canada. There are loads of tour companies doing trips out to the Grand Canyon....bus / plane / helicopter combos.....obviously bus is the cheapest (I think they were quoting $99+) whereas the helicopter ones where the most expensive at $300+). Best place to look is to use tripadvisor.com where you can do a search to find out what other people think. I did a plane trip there which was about $250 as I remember...and takes a good half a day to do. As far as I'm aware trips aren't run from Los Angeles (I might be wrong)..it must be about 500 miles or so from LA so would be quite a trip (Its about 150-200 miles from vegas.

We then flew back to Vancouver to get the flight back to Gatwick with Canadain Affair. I did look at the idea of flying back to the UK through the states and avoiding going back to Canada, but I found going back to Vancouver was by far the cheapest option. Enjoy!!

dwhl

Thanks for this......may just go ahead and book it. best price for the Vancouver to Las Vegas return trip is using philippine airlines at around 400 pounds, using onetravel.com. It's cheaper direct from the philippine airline website direct but their website is not secure (no padlock) does anyone know what they are like?

Also does anyone know any good fairly cheap hotels in las vegas? not particularly looking for one on the strip....

thanks

btw would say thanks using the "THANKS" button but not sure how to anymore!!!

richcaw18

if you want to fly home from us rather than canada i think you would need to go via LA, there are not many direct flyers to Las Vegas from UK to my knowledge. LA is just over half a days drive on the interstate.

As regards Vegas, once you are off the strip you can find very cheap rooms - even some of the older casino hotels on the strip do rooms for around £25 a night e.g. riviera, stardust - the key thing is not to stay there on a Friday or Saturday as the rates are pumped up for weekend visitors and where there are big events on.

The GC is a fair drive from Vegas and accommodation in the park is likely to sold out for your dates - check at grandcanyonlodges.com neareast town is Williams which a range of accommodation from the chain motels upwards.

As an alternative, you could consider San Francisco and Yosemite National Park. Flight options to SFO may be greater than Las Vegas and there is plenty around there within driving distance - Monterey/Carmel, Napa Valley, Lake Tahoe as well as Yosemite which has amazing views and hiking etc. At that time the waterfalls in the park should be running at full flow. Thats about half a day drive from SF. Again park accomodation, if available, will be very expensive (unless you want to camp) Nearest places are oakhurst, el portal which have cheaper options

maxi_isa

Flydrive in the canadian Rockies is a great idea. It is the best way to explore the National Park areas. We did it two years (in May) ago by flying to Calgary with hotels in Banff and Jasper. The drive to Jasper has to be one of the best in the world and there are fantastic things to see all along the route (eg mountains, waterfalls, lakes, wildlife).

sulliebear

Hi
My husband and I have just returned from travelling around the USA and Canada for 7 months and just thought that I would offer you some of our experiences.

We flew to Toronto (as our first destination) from the UK with CanadianAffair because it was over half the price as to fly to USA. They were a brilliant airline, the only fault was the lower baggage allowance (but then we were going for seven months).

Vancouver is a wonderful city, you need at least a day to explore the city, a day to go across on the ferry to Grouse Mountain and Capilano Suspension Bridge (don't pay for organised trip, public transport is very easy for this), you then want to spend a day in Stanley Park - gorgous place.

Can't offer much advice about the rockies from that end. We went to Colorado to see these.

As for the Grand Canyon, much too far from LA. We went to Vegas and after a lot of research found some interesting information out. We personally took an helicopter trip to the Canyon, landed had champagne breakfast and flew back over the strip - absolutely wonderful. However, here is the catch, as you might know the Canyon is Indian territory and therefore the companies have to pay to fly and land in the Canyon, THERE IS ONLY ONE COMPANY ALLOWED TO LAND ON THE BASE OF THE CANYON, albiet most of the others give you the impression that they land, they don't, they actually land on the rim. From what we heard from a lot of americans that we met along the way, the bus trip is very long and tiring, you get off, stand on a lookout over the canyon, take pics and travel back.

Yes this company is more expensive but this is a once in a lifetime experience, it has state of the art helicopters and a second to none safety record which is important considering the amount of tourist accidents that happened in the states last year. They are also just situated off the strip so you actually get about 45minutes in the helicopter travelling to the canyon and then the same coming back. Other companies you have to drive for an hour or so and then have a 20min flight.

The way we looked at it was, how much would you pay for a helicopter trip on its own and then how much would you pay to see the canyon.

The company was called Maverick.

Have a really good think about it, sometimes saving a few bucks is not worth it.

Also with regards to hotels in Vegas, we stayed in the Sahara which is at the far end of the strip but a nice hotel. The problem with off the strip hotels is that remember you will have to walk back to the hotel in the dead of the night (unless you get a cab), Vegas has it's problems at night like anywhere else.

One last thing please remember that even in the US, you get what you pay for, some of the motels look ok on the website etc but having stayed in over 30 hotels/motels I do know what I am talking about.

If you need any further info just let me know.

Murphy_The_Cat

sulliebear wrote:

As for the Grand Canyon, much too far from LA. We went to Vegas and after a lot of research found some interesting information out. We personally took an helicopter trip to the Canyon, landed had champagne breakfast and flew back over the strip - absolutely wonderful. However, here is the catch, as you might know the Canyon is Indian territory and therefore the companies have to pay to fly and land in the Canyon, THERE IS ONLY ONE COMPANY ALLOWED TO LAND ON THE BASE OF THE CANYON, albiet most of the others give you the impression that they land, they don't, they actually land on the rim. From what we heard from a lot of americans that we met along the way, the bus trip is very long and tiring, you get off, stand on a lookout over the canyon, take pics and travel back.

Yes this company is more expensive but this is a once in a lifetime experience, it has state of the art helicopters and a second to none safety record which is important considering the amount of tourist accidents that happened in the states last year. They are also just situated off the strip so you actually get about 45minutes in the helicopter travelling to the canyon and then the same coming back. Other companies you have to drive for an hour or so and then have a 20min flight.

The way we looked at it was, how much would you pay for a helicopter trip on its own and then how much would you pay to see the canyon.

The company was called Maverick.

Have a really good think about it, sometimes saving a few bucks is not worth it.

We used this company
for our Grand Canyon helicoptor trip and we put down at a ranch close by for lunch and "cowboyey things" it was great.
I can't rcommend a Grand Canyon helicoptor trip enough (regardless of which company you use) and I'll share a Murphyism with you

"The memories of the event are still there but the cost has been long forgotten.

MTC

dwhl

thanks everyone for the help...tried to press the thanks button but it doesn't seem to be working......

dwhl

hi there

bringing back this old thread again.....

for a variety of reasons never managed to get to the rockies in 06 but planning this year. intend to goto calgary and then fly out of vancouver approx 2 weeks later back to manchester. planning to go in september 08.

the places, en route, that are vaguely in my mind are banff, jasper,lake louise, kamloops ?whistler.

would be grateful if anyone could help with suggestions of places to visit and help me plan this tour... how many days should i spend in each place? where should i stay? etc

thanks so much
david

Sheel

dwhl wrote: »

hi there

bringing back this old thread again.....

for a variety of reasons never managed to get to the rockies in 06 but planning this year. intend to goto calgary and then fly out of vancouver approx 2 weeks later back to manchester. planning to go in september 08.

the places, en route, that are vaguely in my mind are banff, jasper,lake louise, kamloops ?whistler.

would be grateful if anyone could help with suggestions of places to visit and help me plan this tour... how many days should i spend in each place? where should i stay? etc

We toured the Rockies just over 2 years ago and it was a fabulous trip and i'm sure you'll love it. Did it the opposite way to what you're planning though , started off by flying into Seattle and then drove up to Vancouver and ended up in Calgary. I would definitely visit Banff , Jasper and Lake Louise , but the OH and I didn't think much of Kamloops and would only stay there one night if you can't avoid it.My OH fell in love with Jasper though and wanted to move there!

I would stay at least 2 or 3 nights in places like Banff and Jasper to give you time to explore the area. The one drawback of our trip was that we only spent a night in each place (was a Kuoni holiday so we were tied to an itinerary) and it was all a bit rushed and there was a lot of driving involved. Going back to Kamloops , maybe we just didn't have time to see the best of it :undecided

As to where to stay , I would personally look on Tripadvisor and see what gets good reviews that is in your budget.