At 7 a.m. this Saturday, the Banff Centre Mountain Film and Book Festival's free Sunrise Hike with Oboz Footwear and YETI leaves from KCCI. Sunrise in Banff on November 7 is at 8:45 a.m. Under last year's clock, the same sunrise would have shown 7:45.
That gap comes from the first week of Alberta Time, and it shows where the light went. The festival's final weekend lines up with the season's first ski days, but the extra daylight from the clock change doesn't land in Banff's mornings. It lands in the evenings.
November 1 came and the clocks stayed put
On Sunday, Alberta switched to permanent daylight time, officially called Alberta Time or ABT. The Government of Alberta puts it plainly: there's no turning clocks back in November and no moving them forward in March. Its ABT explainer defines the zone as UTC−6, the time Albertans used to call Mountain Daylight Time. The change came through Bill 31, the Red Tape Reduction Statutes Amendment Act, 2026, which got Royal Assent on May 14, 2026.
The province's case leans on evenings: "more evening sunshine to enjoy with family and friends." Here's what that looks like in Banff, using timeanddate's Banff sun tables, with the old standard-time readings found by subtracting one hour:
| Date | Sunrise, Alberta Time | Sunset, Alberta Time | Old clock would have read |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sunday, Nov. 1 | 8:35 a.m. | 6:15 p.m. | 7:35 a.m. / 5:15 p.m. |
| Saturday, Nov. 7 | 8:45 a.m. | 6:05 p.m. | 7:45 a.m. / 5:05 p.m. |
| Monday, Dec. 21 | 9:43 a.m. | 5:37 p.m. | 8:43 a.m. / 4:37 p.m. |
On the winter solstice, sunset in town now comes after 5:30 p.m., and sunrise comes close to 9:45 a.m. Any Banff schedule set by the clock instead of the sun now starts an hour earlier relative to daylight.
The lifts moved half an hour. The mornings moved a full hour.
The ski hills reset their schedules first. From opening day this season, Banff Sunshine Village, Lake Louise Ski Resort and Mt. Norquay run lifts from 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Alberta Time, keeping the seven-hour day. SkiBig3 says the later start gives operations teams the daylight they need for grooming checks and, where required, avalanche safety work.
That's a half-hour shift to cover a full hour of lost morning light, and the crews feel the difference. Kendra Scurfield, Sunshine's vice-president of brand and communications, told the Rocky Mountain Outlook that "it is definitely going to be a learning curve on our end," because crews use early light to inspect runs, check fencing and signage, and get lifts ready to run safely. The same report says SkiBig3 marketing director Rachel Wilson sees a possible upside in the extra afternoon light for après and other Bow Valley activities.
With last chair at 4:30 and a sunset after 6 p.m. this week, there's now about an hour and a half of daylight between leaving the hill and dark. Under the old clock, sunset at 5:05 would have come barely half an hour after a 4:30 last chair.
The season is opening in stages:
- Lake Louise Ski Resort announced on October 30 that it would open Sunday, November 1.
- Banff Sunshine Village is tentatively set to open Friday, November 6. Its own mountain report calls it early November and weather dependent.
- Mt. Norquay gave November 7 as its tentative opening day in its October 31 conditions update.
The SkiBig3 winter shuttle season started November 1, and SkiBig3 says shuttle, lesson and rental times may shift to match the new lift hours. SkiBig3 Snow School morning and full-day bookings now start at 9:30 a.m. ABT, and afternoon bookings at 1:30 p.m.
The festival's last weekend, read against the new clock
The 51st festival runs through Sunday, November 8. Its daytime schedule follows the clock, so on the hill the mornings now feel earlier and the evenings later. Here's Saturday's free program with sunrise and sunset added:
- 7:00 a.m. Sunrise Hike with Oboz Footwear and YETI, from KCCI
- 8:00 a.m. Nikon Photo Walk with Kristian Bogner, Nikon Ambassador
- 8:30 a.m. Backcountry 101 with Yamnuska Mountain Adventures, at Arc'teryx Banff downtown
- 8:45 a.m. Sunrise
- 10:00 a.m. The Enormocast, live; the Festival Marketplace opens at Kinnear Centre
- 2:00 p.m. BanffPitch, free with no registration, where the winning pitch takes a $25,000 CAD award
- 4:30 p.m. Tales & Ales
- 5:00 p.m. ACC x YETI Alpine Allies Happy Hour, Photo Rodeo, and the Patio Party at the Jenny Belzberg Theatre Patio, running until 7:30 with live music
- 6:05 p.m. Sunset
- 7:30 p.m. Barry Blanchard with films
Three of Saturday's free events start before the sun is up. The Saturday Patio Party now runs across sunset, so its first hour is in daylight. On the old clock, the party would have started five minutes before sunset.
Friday works the same way. The Marketplace runs 4 to 7 p.m., the Adventure Filmmakers Workshop Showcase is on the Rab Stage at 4:30, and the Patio Party runs 6 to 7:30, starting just as the sun goes down. Friday's 7:30 p.m. program is Sarah Hueniken and Ines Papert with films. On Sunday the Marketplace is open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., the free talks wrap up with Framing the Environment: Ethics at 3:30, and the evening closes with Best of the Festival, the awards presentation and films, at 7:30.
Getting up Tunnel Mountain for the evening sessions
Most of the weekend's best-lit hours are on the Banff Centre campus, and parking there is tight. Parking costs $7 a day for anyone on campus during the festival. Spaces are limited and not guaranteed, and the Banff Centre warns that you may have to park on Tunnel Mountain Drive and walk in.
Roam Transit runs extended Route 7 service to the festival through November 8. Route 7 links downtown stops and the Fenlands Recreation Centre with the Banff Centre, and from November 6 to 8 the ride is free if you show the driver a physical or digital festival ticket. On November 7 and 8, the festival guide also lists a free Banff Airporter in-town shuttle with morning and evening runs between downtown hotel stops and the Jenny Belzberg Theatre.
Where the extra hour goes in town
Off campus, the later sunset helps most at places that stay open into the evening. The Festival Gallery Hop is a free-to-wander, self-guided route through November 8. Stops include Gaye Adams's The Nature of Light at Canada House Gallery, Murray McDonnell's Bright Hills / High Places at Willock & Sax Gallery, and Thick as Thieves at the Whyte Museum, which is open daily from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. John Webster's artist residency at Mountain Galleries in the Fairmont Banff Springs and the Indigenous Art Collection at Juniper Hotel & Bistro are listed through Friday, November 6. On campus, the Walter Phillips Gallery has Diane Borsato's A Clean Place to Swim as a free exhibition.
Some later spots fill out the rest of the evening:
- The Train Station welcome sign park. The Town opened this 2,000-square-metre park in September, after moving the sign from Norquay Road. It has three timed gas fire pits, seating and a trail.
- The Banff Gondola. Open 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. through November 19, then until 10 p.m. from November 20.
- Banff Upper Hot Springs. Scheduled to reopen in early November after a maintenance closure that started October 13. Regular hours are 10 a.m. to 10 p.m., with last entry at 9:30.
- Taste for Adventure. Today, November 5, is the last day on the Banff & Lake Louise Tourism calendar. The Hot Chocolate Trail starts a week later, on November 12, and runs to February 7.
The solstice comes six weeks after the festival closes. By then sunset is 5:37 p.m., and the last-chair-to-dusk gap is about an hour, up from roughly 7 minutes under the old clock.
If you're trying to decide whether the new clock changes when you'd want to list, buy or book showings in Banff this winter, Vincent & Wright Group is happy to go through it with you, with the festival schedule in one hand and the sun tables in the other. Connect with a Canmore & Banff property specialist.
