‘Doing a season’ in Banff

I recently returned to England after an epic season in Banff, Canada. Before I left, I remember having to endlessly search through forums and websites to put together some idea of what to expect when I arrived.  Now that the seasons all done and dusted, I figured I should try and put my journalism degree to good use. Here is a guide that covers most of the subjects I wish I had known about before I arrived.

Banff, Canada

Banff is the largest town in Banff National Park. Situated in the heart of the Canadian Rockies, Banff is the town with the highest elevation in Canada at 1,463m (4,800ft) above sea level. More importantly, it is also an area of Canada that hosts the longest snow season in the country. With three ski resorts close by, and a breathtaking amount of natural beauty to enjoy, it is easy to understand why tourism continues to increase, year after year.

Getting to Banff

Located 78miles West of Calgary, the town is easily accessible for both national and international visitors. From Calgary International Airport, it costs around $30 to catch the bus to Banff. Four departures leave the airport daily to the Banff/Lake Louise area. The journey should take about 1.5 hours to Banff, depending on road conditions, and traffic. Some airline companies also provide inclusive transport to Banff as part of their flight package; worth looking into to save a bit of hassle after a 10 hour flight.

Where to Stay – Short Term

To some extent, this relies on how you intend to spend the season. For example, whether you are planning to work, or whether you arranged anything before you arrived. In my case, I pretty much had nothing prepared apart from booking two weeks in a local hostel. There are three hostels in town and as can be expected from any hostel, they all have their ups and their downs.

• HI Alpine Hostel

The Hostel I personally stayed at was the HI Alpine Hostel. The best value if you can secure a two-week jobseekers package before you arrive. Basically, you pay for two weeks accommodation and if you do happen to move out before then, you will be refunded the nights you had left. In location to the town, the hostel sits atop a hill about 15 minutes walk away. The walk back from town can grow fairly tiresome but its not bad for getting you ‘snow-fit’ before the snow begins to fall. The hostel also has a pretty cool bar, full of like minded travellers and, in my experience, a bucket load of Australians. On that note, the first few weeks I was in Banff, it actually felt like being in Australia. Not a bad thing, but still something that takes you by surprise. In fact, when I got back to England, my accent had become a bizarre mix of Aussie and Canadian; Austradian if you will.

Visit www.hihostels.ca for more info.

• Banff Samesun Hostel

The second Hostel is ‘The Banff Samesun Hostel’, located right in the centre of the town. I never actually visited this hostel but gained a far idea of what it was like from friends who stayed there when they arrived. From what I gathered, the staff are all pretty laid back and as a result, the hostel has a bit of a party atmosphere. I didn’t speak to anyone who really didn’t enjoy staying here but there were a few complaints; Things like, some of the windows didn’t have locks and some of the rooms smelt of smoke. Obviously, being right on Banff Avenue, this hostel is great for job hunting and reasonably priced.

Visit www.samesun.com for more info.

• YWCA Hostel

The third place to stay is the YWCA hostel. From all accounts, a pretty standard hostel with a cool vibe. Located just over the bridge, at the end of Banff Av, it’s also perfect for job hunting. One of my friends actually ended up staying here long-term as the rent was cheap and he only really used it as a place to sleep. This is also the building that hosts the Banff Ambassador course. Basically a 3 hour lecture about Banff which gives you a massive discount on your ski-pass. Well worth it.

Visit www.ywcabanff.ab.ca for more info.

Where to Stay – Long Term

Along with hunting for a job, trying to find a place to live for the season will be a primary focus. According to few of the locals I worked with, the hunt for accommodation gets tougher every year. The earlier you can get to Banff, the better. I foolishly arrived right at the end of October, to discover that most people I met had been trying to find somewhere to live for the past few weeks. Banff basically has two periods, a winter and a summer cycle. The best time to try and secure accommodation is as the summer seasonnaires leave town. My recommendation would be to get to town near the beginning of October, possibly mid September for the best chance of securing your own room/place. The good news is that the housing situation is no where near as ridiculous as Whistler; trust me, I tried. 800 dollars a month to sleep in a bathtub, no thanks.

Obviously, your first choice for accommodation would be to secure your own room. The best way to attempt this method is to be the first to phone all of the classifieds in the local newspaper ‘The Crag and Canyon’ on Tuesday, every week. This is of course, the method everyone gets told about, and competition to even view a room is tough. However, I did meet a lot of people who stuck at it, and within a few weeks they had found somewhere to stay.
Another way of securing a bed is to find a job that provides accommodation. The employers in town are aware of how hard it is to find housing and most of them will try to provide somewhere to stay at a reduced rate. As can be expected, the quality of staff accommodation varies massively from one employer to the other. From what I heard, the Banff Centre and the Fairmont Banff Springs offer great accommodation but its highly sought after. A few of my friends worked at McDonalds for the season and their staff accommodation was super cheap. I suppose it really all depends on personal preference, but in my opinion, take what you can get.
There are a few more options. As I mentioned before, the YWCA Hostel offers certain beds for seasonal use. Two of the hotels near the HI hostel also offer seasonal buildings for 4-8 people. In these cases, you pay for the entire building so to make it a financially viable option its worth filling the rooms; even if it does require sharing beds. A lot of my friends were lucky enough to secure one of these buildings and they sounded pretty cool with quite a few perks: hot tub, free bus into town, gym membership.

The building I moved into after my short stay at a hostel was a share house in the centre of town. The place is pretty well known in town and used to be referred to as the crack house. However, don’t let the name throw you off. A few years ago the former landlord went a little overboard and starting filling the rooms with anyone and everyone; I heard some rumours of 10 people to a bedroom. Nowadays, the property is under new management and it’s a great place to live. The building has been entirely renovated and at most, it is 4 people to a bedroom. It may be a little pricey but being in the centre of town, the location helps to take the sting off. This is also a great place to stay while you look for your own room if you require one. That’s what I did and I ended up with one of the best rooms in town… after 3 months.

Finding work

When it comes to work there are basically two options. You can either work for the hill or work in town. Both options have good and bad points but in my opinion, its much better to find work in town. The wages for working on the hill are ridiculously low and the only way to really make it a financially viable means of income is to live in the staff accommodation. From all accounts, the accommodation is pretty standard but it means living up on the hill for at least 6 months. At first, I actually thought this might be quite cool but apparently as the season progresses most people grew tired and started to feel a little trapped. A few of my friends worked on the hill and lived in town and apart from getting themselves into a bit of debt they had a great time.
Finding work in town is difficult and can become even trickier depending on the time of year. Even though I arrived late, by most peoples recommendations, a lot of the employers were not willing to hire new staff until things began to get busy. The standard approach is to make yourself a resume that Canadian employers will understand and blanket drop the entire town. Of course, this method is successful for a lot of people but make sure you actually get a chance to speak to the employer rather than just ticking off each shop by handing in a resume, which will inevitably, be added to the ever growing pile.

I was extremely fortunate when it came to finding work quickly but I met a lot of people who had to wait a few weeks before anything came to the surface. A good method of ensuring you don’t run out of money to soon is to find a crappy job to do until something better comes along. The good news is, I did not meet anyone who didn’t eventually find work. The employers in Banff are well aware that every Summer and Winter they will have to lose, and then hire new staff. On top of that, people often quit their job to take on a new one or decided to leave Banff for various reasons. In my opinion, the best position to be in is to have a job in town and have your own accommodation. That way, if you quit or get fired you’re not left homeless and have somewhere to stay while you find a new job. Although, if you find a job you enjoy and it provides staff accommodation than definitely go for it. This way, you’ve got somewhere cheap to stay if you feel like finding your own accommodation in town.

Season ski pass

A few of the employers in town will offer a discounted pass or some sort of benefit so it may be worth holding off on buying one until you find work. However, possibly the best snippet of advice I can offer is how to save quite a lot of money on your season pass. Basically, the most popular form of pass on offer is the ‘Big 3’. This pass gives you unlimited access to Sunshine, Norquay and the Lake. While I was in Banff, the pass cost around 1600 dollars inc tax which does seem amazingly expensive, considering it doesn’t cover transport costs to the mountains. However, it is a really long season and you will definitely make your money back a lot quicker than you thought.

To save about 400 dollars on this pass all you need to do is complete the Banff ambassadors course. The course is basically a 3 hour lecture on the history of Banff which is actually quite interesting. On top of receiving the discount for your ski pass, the card you receive when you complete the course also gives you free admission to most of the touristy venues in town. As I found out, a great thing to have when the snow melts and you have still got a month in town to kill. The course is run fairly regularly up until the 31st January and to register all you need is proof of local employment or address. The course takes place at the YWCA and you register at Ski hub in town; the shop that sells the season passes. I was actually pretty tight for cash when I got to town and although I completed the course I chose to buy a sunshine season pass and then upgrade when finances were less of an issue.

Visit www.skibig3.com for more info

Banking

In Banff, there is a choice of two banks, CIBC and BMO. I originally opened an account at CIBC but soon discovered I could get a better deal at BMO. Not to slate CIBC, I was actually pretty happy with the service they provided but if you have proof of recent graduation or anything that would suggest ‘student’ status, BMO offer free banking. Furthermore, instead of paying the money directly into your bank account, some employers around town will use ’local’ cheques to pay their employees. During my time in Banff, CIBC took 5 working days to clear one of these cheques where as BMO cleared the cheques instantly; a great help if you can not afford to wait another week for cash.

Transfers from Canadian bank accounts to UK accounts actually proved fairly complicated. Basically, you need to find out what your international banking number and international sort code are. Which doesn’t sound that tricky but It took me a while. If you are planning to transfer, its definitely worth transferring as much as possible in one go. This tact, makes it hard to take advantage of the best currency exchange rate but it does save you money on fees that are applied every time you transfer, both ends of the transaction.

In terms of international banking,most places will accept visa or MasterCard. At my time of arrival, I was using a maestro which turned out to be an issue. Basically, some of the cash machines in town let you use maestro but absolutely rinse you on fee’s. My advice would be to use travellers cheques or one of those ‘money passport’ things for your first few weeks in town.

Finance

The amount of money you choose to take to Banff will most probably reflect how you intend to spend the season. When I was planning for my season, I remember of lot of sources advised people to have at least 1000 pounds to hand. I figured I would play it safe and managed to save up about 1500 pounds. As I soon found out, travelling is an expensive business. Before I arrived in Banff I bought a snowboard, spent two weeks in Whistler and travelled around various parts of the USA. After all this I eventually arrived in Banff with about 800 pounds. After a week in a local hostel and paying for my first months rent, I was pretty close to broke when my first wage cheque finally came through. For this reason, I would advise taking at least a grand if you plan to turn up in town in the same fashion as I did.

The more you can save up before you leave the better. However, everyone’s financial situation will be affected by different variables and I’m sure a lot people arrived in town with less than I did and still had a great season. Just remember to include the cost of your season ski pass in your planning and when you do get to town try not too get too lost in the excitement until you can afford too. It really is a long season.

Mobile Phones

This is a particular department of Canadian life that can prove amazingly frustrating. As far as I am aware, BUNAC are the only company that offer working holiday visa’s to UK travellers. So, if you did secure your visa through BUNAC you will be required to attend an orientation talk. The orientation is a fairly useful experience and they offer solo mobile contracts at the end of the presentation. The deal they offered us did seem to be pretty good and as I discovered, having a phone for the first few weeks of setting up is pretty useful but after that it just became a hassle. Eventually, I changed my phone to prepaid and used a phone card to phone home from time to time. I suppose it depends on your own personal preference but financially having a prepaid phone will save you a lot of money and frustration. I would definitely recommend shelling out for a prepaid phone first, and then decide whether you need to upgrade. Overall, Canadian phones are expensive. Unlike the UK, companies also charge the phone owner to receive calls, even if you don’t answer it. Which is great when your on the hill all day and later discover you have 10 miscalls and very little credit remaining.

Other morsels of advice

• A local charity, Banff life offer a free pasta night once a week which is wicked when you’re strapped for cash.
• Hitchhiking up to the mountains may seems a little intimidating at first but all the locals are used to it and it is way cheaper than spending 15 dollars on a return bus ticket. That’s right, nearly 8 pounds to travel four miles to Norquay. Ridiculous.
• Get a Safeway card from customer services before you start shopping. They save you loads.
• Bring a lot of warm clothes. Like most people I was aware it got cold in Banff but hugely underestimated just how cold it would get. Think, frozen nostrils cold.
• Travel light. You will return home with way more than you took with you.
• Bring a plug adapter. They cost a fair bit in Banff.

I’m sure this list could fill a few more pages but I seem to have hit a wall. I’m happy to answer any questions anyone has about anything and I hope this helped. Banff really is an amazing place and hopefully, it should now be a bit easier for you to enjoy! Thanks for reading!