Getting there
Forty-eight kilometres, about an hour, and no public bus. Getting to the Maligne Lake cruise from Jasper is the part people plan least and regret most — partly because the road itself is one of the best things in the park, and partly because if you have no car there is exactly one way to solve it.
Quick answer
The boathouse is forty-eight kilometres from Jasper along the Maligne Valley Road, about an hour with stops, and there is no public bus. If you have a car, drive: the road passes Maligne Canyon and Medicine Lake and is reliable wildlife country at dawn and dusk. If you do not, book a day tour that includes the Maligne Lake cruise from Jasper — from $140 with transport, a guide and the sailing.
The road up
Maligne Canyon, Medicine Lake, and the most reliable wildlife road in the park.
Maligne Canyon, fifteen minutes out of town. The river has cut a limestone gorge more than fifty metres deep and barely wide enough to spit across in places, with six bridges over it. Twenty minutes gets you the top two; an hour gets you most of it. In winter the whole thing freezes and becomes an ice walk.
Medicine Lake, about halfway. It fills every spring and drains away every autumn through sinkholes into one of the largest underground river systems in North America, reappearing downstream near the canyon. Depending on the month you will see a lake or a gravel flat, and both are worth the stop.
And the road itself. This is the wildlife road in Jasper. Black bears on the verges in early summer, elk in the meadows, moose in the wet ground near the lake. Anyone taking the Maligne Lake cruise from Jasper on a day tour gets a guide watching the treeline; anyone driving should go early and slowly.
If you have no car
They exist because the alternative is nothing.
No public transport runs the Maligne Valley Road. The Maligne Lake cruise from Jasper by any means other than a car or a tour is not possible.
Six hours: the valley, the canyon and the sailing.
674 reviews at 4.8, and the wildlife focus is the difference.
Eight and a half hours, with more of the park added around the cruise.
Which makes them practical if you arrived by train, as many people do.
A six-hour wildlife day with a lakeshore walk. Check the row before booking.
If you are taking the train to Jasper and have no car, the day tours are not an upgrade on the Maligne Lake cruise from Jasper — they are the only way to reach the boat at all.
Which trip is best→Book direct
Three day tours that include the drive, and the standalone sailing for anyone driving themselves.
★ 4.7 · 253 reviews
★ 4.8 · 674 reviews
★ 4.4 · 18 reviews
★ 4.7 · 1,211 reviews
Common questions
Forty-eight kilometres along the Maligne Valley Road, about an hour by car with stops.
No public bus. The only ways to reach the Maligne Lake cruise from Jasper are your own vehicle or a day tour that includes transport.
Yes. Maligne Canyon and Medicine Lake are both on it, and it is the most reliable wildlife road in the park at dawn and dusk.
Yes, and it fills on summer mornings — another reason to take the first sailing.
Almost none on the valley road. Save your voucher offline before you leave town.
About half a day: an hour up, ninety minutes on the water, an hour back, plus the stops.
Go deeper
From $85 for the boat, and what the full days add.
The verdictThe cruise alone, or a day with it in the middle.
Spirit IslandFourteen kilometres up the lake, and no road or trail to it.
BookingSailing times, how far ahead to book, and what sells out.
Ninety minutesNinety minutes on the water, and half a day in total.
ComparedFourteen kilometres each way, and why almost nobody paddles it.
Jasper National Park: Maligne Lake Cruise With Guide
★ 4.9 · 646 reviews · Free cancellation 24 h