With a KOA campground, you always know you are getting a safe, family-friendly environment. All KOA campgrounds offer level campsites suited to everything from tents to pull-through RVs, clean bathrooms with hot showers and laundry facilities, and an on-site store. Many also offer rental cabins, swimming pools, mini golf, game rooms, and even wireless Internet service. Every KOA campground across North America has passed an annual 600-point inspection. As an added bonus, the KOA Value Card ($24 USD per year) gives an automatic 10% discount on daily camping registration fees, discounts with KOA partners, and you can also save up points toward camping rewards.

The KOA brand is not as established in Canada as it is in the United States. In Alberta, there is only one KOA campground, the Hinton/Jasper KOA, located just 18 kilometres outside the east gates of Jasper National Park, which places it nearly in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains of Canada. To reach it, just follow the Transcanada Highway (#16 in Alberta) west from Edmonton until you reach Hinton. At that point the KOA is just four kilometres further, less than a four-minute drive. The Transcanada is well-marked throughout its route with a white maple leaf, but it is not a freeway. In places it may be four-lane without a centre median, but throughout most of its route it is a two-lane highway, which may be challenging to those towing larger house trailers or driving larger RVs. The ideal may be to set up a base before reaching the deep mountains, from which day trips can be taken into Jasper and Banff National Parks and along the continental divide. For this, the KOA location is perfect.

The Hinton/Jasper KOA campground offers campsites suitable for everything up to a maximum of 85 foot pull-through. You can also rent one-room ‘kabins’, as well as bicycles for later exploration. WiFi and cable television access are available at no extra charge, as is a communal kitchen. (KOA ‘kabins’ and standard ‘kottages’, unlike KOA lodges and deluxe ‘kottages’, do not include a private kitchen.) The campground offers planned activities at the pavilion, which is also available for meetings.

The scenery in this entire region is spectacular, the wildlife and foliage simply amazing. City inhabitants of Jasper often find bighorn sheep browsing on their lawns. The Jasper Tramway, longest and highest guided tramway in Canada, offers a unique view of the city and the six separate mountain ranges which constitute