I live in a place with precious little change in elevation. The city landfill might be the highest point above sea level (crop level?) in Saskatoon. On the outskirts of the city, on clear days, it feels like if you stood on your tip toes, you might be able to see the Calgary Tower off in the distance. Granted, that’s hyperbole, but you get the picture.

For honeymoon number six, continuing a grand relationship tradition that has freed both of us from anniversary gift shopping, we choose to do a western Canadian road trip for our first ever visit to Calgary, and then a day trip onward up into the Rockies. Mountains, much like oceans, never get old to my eyes.

We pointed our car in the direction of Kananaskis for a more laid back, less crowded day in the Rockies. Summer in Banff and Lake Louise is really just a series of traffic jams and parking nightmares with a backdrop of stunning scenery. No such issue in Kananaskis Country. On a Sunday morning drive along highway 40, it felt like we had this slice of beautiful Alberta all to ourselves.

Even pulling into a cluster of resorts at Kananaskis Village to grab a coffee and stretch our legs, there was a hush over the place. Mountains, trees and water have that affect of keeping things tranquil. It was nice to be able to soak in the mountain views in such a peaceful setting.

While there weren’t any crowds, I did bump into Canadian musical royalty in the person of Andy Maize, lead singer of one of my favourite bands, the Skydiggers. He was in the area for a family wedding and we had a nice chat before going our separate ways. He was a lovely gentleman and it was a great serendipitous encounter for two big fans of his music over the past 30 years or so.

After our chance meeting, we cued up a Skydiggers playlist – outstanding road trip music, especially in this part of the country. We got back in the car and continued our journey down highway 40, gawking out the windows as new mountains came into view as the road twisted, dipped and rose. With the kilometres adding up, we parked to again stretch our legs in a rest stop lookout.

Back in Kananaskis Village, my wife had picked up a new summer hat and here, is showing it off in all its splendour, with a stunning backdrop.

We loved the mountain scenery so much, that after getting toward the end of the mountainous part of the highway, we turned around and went back through the mountains in the opposite direction to see them in a different light rather than just completing the circle back to Calgary. Pretty good idea in my books and a nice road trip as part of honeymoon 6.