Epic Travel → North America → Canada → Jasper National Park → Maligne Canyon

Location:  Jasper area, Jasper National Park, Alberta

Distance: 4 km/2.5 miles roundtrip to 5^th bridge (8 km/5 miles roundtrip to 6^thbridge)

Elevation Gain: 140 meters/460 feet

Time Required: 1-3 hours

Red Tape/Notes: Expect crowds. Food and drink are available at the tea house near the trailhead. Entry into Jasper requires a daily fee of about $10 per person (or ~$20 per family/group); alternatively, you can buy a Parks Canada Discovery Pass if you’re staying for an extended time.

What’s Nearby?: Maligne Lake Fishing, Spirit Island Cruise

This is the other annoyingly popular hike in Jasper (along with Valley of the Five Lakes), but it’s worth visiting anyway. The hike provides beautiful views of the carved canyon (the deepest one in Jasper National Park – reaching 50 meters deep at times) and is one of the area’s classics; the water is normally a beautiful shade of blue, but there had been so much rain when we visited that the blue colour was scarcely visible due to the vast quantities of whitewater. No matter, though, it was still very pretty. There are numerous bridge crossings, so you can vary the length of the hike depending on your group’s time and energy level. Between the start of the “trail” (a paved walkway at the beginning, which turns into a wide dirt trail later) and 4^th bridge, the canyon is narrow, with sculpted walls and precipitous drops. The bridge crossings allow you to cross to the other side of the canyon and return viewing the canyon from the opposite side. After 4^th bridge, the trail runs only on one side of the canyon, and between 4^th and 5^th bridge the canyon opens out to become more of a river, continuing this way to 6^th bridge. If you have two cars, you could do the route one way by leaving a shuttle vehicle at 5^th or 6^th bridge. You can also do a full loop from 5^th bridge if you return via the 7F or 7H trails.

Epic Travel → North America → Canada → Jasper National Park → Maligne Canyon