Review: Two Jack Lake Main Campground, Banff National Park

Bighorn Sheep near lake Minnewanka

Location: 20 minutes outside Banff town site
Website:  Parks Canada
Map: Parks Canada (scroll down)
Camping Facilities: Car Camping
Grade: B-
Stargazing: There are stars here?
Summary: Decent spacing for a National Park, but don't expect much scenery
Thoughts: Once you've spent some time car camping in the mountain national parks, your expectations begin to take form.  What you miss out on in privacy and remoteness, you gain in scenery.  You take the good with the bad, but the mountain scenery makes you forget the bad pretty quickly.  Therein lies the problem with Two Jack Lake's main campground (not to be confused with the Two Jack Lakeside campground); it's the opposite of your typical mountain park, decent privacy (not great), but the canopy blocks any potential for enjoying the mountain viewscapes.

A bit of privacy is provided by the well-spaced loops

Fixed-grill fire rings
- the bane of the national park camping experience

You might see some mountains
through the trees

The accessibility to other more scenic areas (Lake Minnewanka, Two Jack Lake, and all the other great spots around the Town of Banff) is undeniable.  The campground itself is just nice enough.  The main benefit is the price for unserviced sites, which as just under $20 before firewood.  Can't really beat that.  As well, the comfort stations have running hot water and flush toilets.


All told, nice sites, decent camping, less-than-stellar scenery, but good access to some of the highlights around the Town of Banff.