The serene reflection of snow-dusted mountains in glacier-fed lakes is a hallmark of the Rocky Mountains of western Canada. The azure of waters of two such lakes, Lake Louise and Maligne Lake, draw tourists, respectively, to Banff and Jasper National Parks, two of four contiguous national parks in the Canadian Rockies. Lake Louise is a winter ski destination, but you can ride the Lake Louise gondola up Mount Whitehorn for panoramic views anytime. Along the Pacific coast of Vancouver Island, explore a temperate rain forest in the Long Beach Unit of Pacific Rim National Park, where spruce trees, often covered in blanket of moss, meet a tide pool-dotted, 10-mile shoreline.
While there is no bypassing the kind of commercialization that repels travel purists, the sheer volume of the Niagara Falls -- up to 700,000 gallons of water per second -- is nonetheless a sight to behold. On the Canadian side of the falls, accessible from Ontario, you can see the Horseshoe Falls and get close to the cascade's spray on a tour boat dubbed the Maid of the Mist. To the delight of some visitors and the chagrin of others, the falls are illuminated by colored lights every night.
Explorer Samuel de Champlain founded Quebec City, of which the historic district now is recognized by UNESCO, and is the only North American city that still has its colonial ramparts. Quebec City's French heritage is central to its identity and embodied by landmarks such as the Eglise Notre Dame des Victoires, a 17th-century stone church that dominates historic plaza Place-Royal, or Royal Square. Although best known for sumptuous seafood, the Atlantic maritime province of Nova Scotia has a World Heritage Site of its own: the old town of Lunenburg. Described by UNESCO as the continent's "best surviving example of a planned British colonial settlement," many of the brightly painted houses in the inscribed area of the village are wooden structures from the 18th and 19th centuries. In Halifax, the provincial capital, the Halifax Citadel National Historic Site draws visitors with its the 19th-century fort and sweeping vistas of downtown Halifax and the Atlantic Ocean.
Visitors who relish gravity-defying heights should ride the glass-floored elevator to the Skypod of the CN Tower in Toronto, Canada's largest metropolis, which at 1,467 feet above ground is one of the highest public observation decks on the planet. The CN Tower ranked as the tallest freestanding structure on Earth prior to the construction of Dubai's Burj Khalifa. Choose a clear day for the best views of Lake Ontario to the south and the city to the north. In western Canada, height junkies can get their adrenaline going by crossing Vancouver's Capilano Suspension Bridge, which hangs -- and sometimes sways -- 230 feet above the Capilano river canyon and spans 450 feet, making it one of the world's longest suspension footbridges. In December, the canyon twinkles with no fewer than 250,000 holiday lights.
