Outdoor Video Magazine

Length: 5km
Time: 2-4hours
Elevation Gain: Approx 400m (guess!)
Techincal Difficulty: Easy, trail-less hike with no exposure (possibility of some good exposed ridge scrambling if you progress further)
Exertion: High
Rating: 8/10
Time done: November 2008

Trail Summary

A good option for a short, interesting hike in the Nordegg area that gets you off the beaten path. Varied terrain, awesome views, and a sense of being in amongst the peaks for relatively little effort. The trail starts from the Hoodoo Creek ‘parking lot’ (road-side) by a large dry stream bed about 38km West of Nordegg, 3km West of Windy Point. On closer inspection, the right one has a large cairn on the North side of the road (and a small flag when I was there), and there is also a 4×4 track leading down to the stream on the South side of the road.

Detail

Start up Hoodoo Creek itself, taking either the stream bed or the faint trail to the right of the stream. The ridge you’re heading up is the one on the righthand side of the creek. After 5 mins or so, there is a large, square, yellow boulder/rock outcrop on your right. This is a good spot to find a faint trail leading away from the creek bed through the trees. Follow this (and make you’re own way) up the obvious ridge. The going is steep through the trees, and good views of Lake Abraham quickly open up behind you. There is a little bit of easy rock scrambling that can equally easily be bypassed and no hands used at all. As you gain height, the trees thin and a number of flatter sections are encountered. Keep pushing on, and eventually you break out of the trees completely and there remains just a short push to the top of the easy part of the ridge, distinguished by a flat area with no trees. This is where we turned back, being in a foot or so of snow. The ridge would be passable for a little while further, if you navigate a fairly tricky looking narrow section. I didn’t fancy it in winter, but may have given it a look in summer.

Return the way you came, taking care not to drift too far to the left on descent or you may get lost in the trees as you try to find your car again.

Length: 44km
Time: 3 days
Elevation gain: 1380m
Difficulty: Moderate (in good conditions, harder in snow!!)
Rating: 9/10

So the Thanksgiving weekend is another great oppurtunity to escape to the mountains for 3 days, if only to avoid the turkey. This time, I was on a University of Alberta Outdoors Club trip to the Skyline Trail in Jasper National Park. After much confusion and careful organising by VP of the club, Ian Curran, 10 people remained on the trip. It was very important that we knew the capabilities and preparedness of the people we had on this trip, as we knew tackling the Skyline in October would be quite the undertaking, given the recent snowfall. The decision was made that all group members should carry snowshoes.

I think this is a GREAT time of year to do the normally busy and over-used Skyline trail. We didn’t expect to see anyone else on the trail, and we hoped that the huge expanses of rock above the treeline would look a lot prettier than the do in summer, given the recent snow. The downside of doing it this time of year, is missing out on the gorgeous alpine meadows and flowers.

We set off from Edmonton around 5ish, and after a quick pitstop at the super-express-gourmet-fastfood restaurant that is Wendy’s in Edson (that is sarcasm. Don’t ever stop there. It took nearly an hour of waiting, and the only entertainment to pass the time was admiring the skill of the staff who had one person to take the orders, and another person whose only observable job was to knock the orders over as they became ready.) we arrived at the campground in Jasper at 10pm for a few beers and a not so early night.

Day 1 - Trailhead to Snowbowl - 12km

We hiked this trail from North to South, to reduce the total elevation gain. After dropping one car off at the Northern traihead on Maligne Lake road, we all headed to Maligne Lake where we would start our hike. After much faffing (I’ve decided that time to get ready increases proportional to number of people squared, although in theory it should take 10 people no longer than one!!) we ready to start hiking at around noon. We started off with 1cm or so of snow on the trail already. The trail winds through spruce and pine forest past some pretty lakes, gaining elevation only gradually, for the first 5km to Evelyn Campground.

After an extended lunch stop (Ian needed to have a full on cooked affair) we were ready to climb the switchbacks to the first pass. This climb wasn’t too bad at all, and we quickly gained elevation and arrived at Little Shovel campground at 8km, where your first views of snowy peaks and valleys open up. It really was looking like skiing season was here! We were now in a good few inches of snow, and as we pressed on up the gradual incline to the pass it quickly deepened to a good foot of snow. The luring ascent to Sunset Peak on the right of the pass caught my eye, and I suggested a quick sidetrip. With three of us capable of leading the group, we decided to split the group into two as not everyone was feeling up to the rather strenuous elevation gain to the top of Sunset Peak. A quick game of rock-paper-scissors determined I was the poor soul who would lead half the group to the campsite, while the others would take the sidetrip. A well worthwhile one from the sound of it, you can ascend the first ridge to the summit from well before the pass, and then drop down a second ridge that brings you out on top of the pass where you can rejoin the trail. The views (from the photos they showed me!) looked fantastic.

Meanwhile, my group bust out the snowshoes as we headed over the pass and down into the snowbowl. A very apt name on this particular day. Gorgeous sun and a stiff breeze provided excellent conditions to enjoy the wintery terrain and stunning vistas in all directions. We reached Snowbowl Campground at 12km, and set up camp. Boxed wine and backcountry cooking provided the entertainment for the rest of the evening.

Day 2 - Snowbowl to Watchtower (skyline aborted) - 12km

One of the group was struggling with the cold and the extra effort the snowshoeing with a big backpack was putting on her, so it was decided the group would again split into two. Ian and Nicole would head out via Watchtower and the rest of us, led by me, would try and finish the Skyline. My group got a (slightly) earlier start at 9.30am (despite the first people being up at 7am…again the person squared law applies to the getting ready time). A rather dark, threatening sky provided an awesome backdrop to sun-lit snowy peaks, and we plodded on towards Big Shovel Pass at 17.5km. The time we were making was pretty bad, and I began to doubt we would have time to make it all the way to Tekarra Campground at 30km. Especially as we still had the Notch, the hardeest part of the trail, still in our way. As we crested the pass in extreme winds, I had my first view of the Notch. It looked impossibly steep, and very, very snow clad. With a large cornice at the top. I didn’t like the look of it at all. Anyway, we had a quick and cold lunch, and then headed on toward Curator Lake through some barren, rocky ground. The wind by now was getting incredibly strong, and the smaller members of the group were having trouble staying vertical! As the wind got stronger, and I had more time to contemplate the Notch, I realised to go on would be foolish. The group wasn’t strong enough to make it over the Notch to the next campground, and the thought of falling short and having to camp out in the exposed ridge beyond the Notch in gale force winds was not very attractive. Not to mention the avalanche risk on the Notch itself..it looked pretty sketchy to me. After a quick discussion we decided to head out via Watchtower too. A steep climb up to Watchtower Pass, and we soon had a view down the picturesque Watchtower Basin. With excess time on our hands now, we decided to frollick in the snow for an hour or so, before heading on to Watchtower Campground, where we joined soon afterwards by Ian and Nicole. The group was reunited.

Very wet snow conditions were worsened when it started to rain, and people retired to bed early. 6 of us squeezed into a Tarn 3 to play several hours of cards.

Day 3 - Watchtower CG to Maligne Lake Road - 10km

When I awoke in the morning, I discovered the rain had turned to 4 inches of snow over night, and everything was frozen solid. A temperature somewhere between -5C and -10C coupled with the rain the night before meant people had to resort to licking tent poles to get them to collapse, and I had to spend nearly 10m de-icing the bear hanger before we could get our food down.

Because we were exiting the trail in the middle of where our two cars were parked, 3 of us went on ahead to get the road first so we could hitchhike and get the cars for when everyone else arrived. The 10km out was a fast, but enjoyable hike along a pretty trail. The fresh snow really added to the gorgeous view of the impressive wall formed by the Colin Range that dominated most of the view ahead. Arriving at the trailhead at around 12.30m, we were suprised to find we had apparently travelled back in time from winter to autumn. It was warm, sunny, dry and there was no snow on the ground for the first time in 3 days. The trees were even still yellow.

It didn’t take me long to get picked up, and we were soon all on our way to Miette hotsprings for the last day of the season.

Good times.

Time: 6-8 hours (dependent on how much playing/investigating you do. It is a beach after all.
Length: 20km
Elevation: Sea-level
Map: None needed. Leaflets from local tourism.
Rating: 7/10

Stretching from Ucluelet to Tofino on Vancouver Island, Long Beach is the most accessible area of the Pacific Rim National Reserve. Long beach itself features a variety of sandy beaches, cobble beaches, rocky headlands and mudflats with sections of beautiful forest featuring sphagnum moss bog, sitka spruce fringe and cedar-hemlock rainforest. Often times Long Beach is swathed in an eerie sea-fret that clears and reforms in seconds mixing bright sunshine with zero visibility mist. It makes for quite the experience though. In terms of hiking, there are 9 marked trails in the Long Beach area, but we decided to have a nice long exploration of the whole beach and hiked one way from an access point at Combers Beach, down to Wickaninnish Headland, round Florencia Bay right down to Halfmoon Bay by Ucluelet. A total of around 20km. Mostly on sand and beaches but with some forest and headland sections at Wickaninnish. It was a pretty tiring way to see it, and was maybe a tad longer than it needed to be (especially when we arrived at the end at 7pm and still had to bike 25km back to the car into a strong head wind!).

It’s definitely worth hiking along Long Beach though, it’s very different from the terrain I’m used to.

So, moving on to Day 3 of the Juan de Fuca (the first part of this post can be found here).

Day 3 - 12km

A nice, easy day of just 12km from Chin Beach to Little Kuitsche Creek campsite. This was a really nice section of the hike, before you reach Sombrio Beach there is a stunning waterfall in a gorgeous little cove, and the trail hugs the shoreline for an extended period. Sombrio Beach itself is a lovely expansive sandy bay that does tend to be VERY busy because of the easy road access. There are some amazing campsites here, but we decided to bypass them because of the crowds. You can do a lot of shore-walking on this section of the hike.

Little Kuitshe Creek campsite is actually tucked away in the forest with some very small, dark, camping pads with no view and no sea access. So why camp there? So we didn’t! With a little bit of beta from some other hikers, we pushed on a few minutes further to Kuitshe Creek itself, where we left the trail and followed the rocky stream bed to a waterfall. An EASY scramble down the side of the waterfall, and you find yourself in Kuitshe Cove. A rock-wall enclosed gravel bay that feels gorgeously secluded. We pitched out tent right on the rocks and enjoyed an amazing evening of solitude in this little bay that looked totally cut off from anything but sea access.

Day 4 - 13km

The final day, Kuitshe Creek to Botanical Beach. The trail finishes with another easy leg, and again there is some nice shore walking to be had on rocky out-crops. An abundance of mussels, seals, and driftwood were to be found. We actually by-passed Botanical Beach because it was high tide. But I hear it is a spectacular place when the tide is down and the rockpools are exposed. We stood in the car park and started to hitchhike. Two of us with huge packs…and it took a little under 25mins for us to get picked up. Not bad huh?

We arrived back at our car to find that a mouse had somehow got trapped in it and had been nibbling food and gear for 4 days. Wonder if it was still alive? We never found it, but left the doors open for a long time so maybe it escaped…..

Time: 3-4 days
Length: 47km
Elevation: Sea-level. But elevation gain around 800m total?
Difficulty: Easy-Medium
Rating: 8/10 (and I’m a mountain lover!)
Map: You can manage with a basic map from any tourist information place that details distances to campsites and road access points. The trail is well marked and easy to follow (in the light!)

The Juan de Fuca is a popular hiking and backpacking trail along the South-Western coast of Vancouver Island. It’s Southern end is located at China Beach, a few km’s West of Jordan River and it finishes 47km further North at Botanical Beach near Port Renfrew. Featuring gorgeous forest, lovely beaches, some rugged coastline, pretty waterfalls and good hiking. Don’t expect wide expanses of sand, and warm, still, crystal blue waters for swimming in though! Although often touted as a wilderness hiking experience…anyone who has done a fair bit of hiking before will realise that the Juan de Fuca is NOT a wilderness experience. The trail covers easy terrain for the most part (the hardest section has some steep ups and downs: the 12km between Bear Beach and Chin Beach) with a bit of mud being your biggest worry (Ok a lot of mud if it’s the wrong time of year). There is also road access at a number of points along the way, so you often bump into toddlers and families along the way (not my idea of a wilderness experience!). Be prepared to meet a lot of people in the popular summer months. This said, it is still a fantastic hike, just not a very wild one.

Because the Juan de Fuca is not a circular hike, you either need two cars, a will to hitchhike (fairly easy), or you can take the shuttle bus that runs from May 1st to Sept. 31st. A pdf of the Juan de Fuca trail map can be found here. And an online version of Walking in British Columbia can be found here.

So I’ll describe how we did the Juan de Fuca, but obviously there are a tonne of options given the spacing of the campsites.

Day 1 - 2km

We started hiking around 8pm (it was August) from the China Beach parking lot, giving us very little light in the dark, dark forest. But that’s OK, we only had an easy 2km to the first campsite at Mystic Beach. But, in the fading light and with the not quite so well marked trail meandering through open trees, previous footprints were hard to find. We suddenly realised we probably weren’t on the trail. But we didn’t know when we’d last been on it either. So we carried on, figuring we knew the general direction we were supposed to be going and the ground was open and easy to cover. But this changed. Thick bushes appeared. And lots of rotting dead fall. And soon, the going was very tough but we’d gone too far to backtrack. We decided to cut to the coast and follow the sea to the campsite. It wasn’t far. But it got worse, and worse. I’ve done some bushwacking before, but this was different. We were progressing at around 500m an hour. The bushes were about 2m high, and the only way to get through was to kind of roll on top of them so you were kinda suspended a metre or so off the ground. When you weren’t doing this you were climbing over, under, along and round huge fallen trees. At one stage a put my foot through such a tree and went up to my thigh in rotting wood. It started getting very dark. We started getting very, very tired and worried. Eventually we came out to the sea, only to find our cunning plan foiled by a 50ft cliff and a waterfall. The beach lurking invitingly below, totally inaccessible. It was a nice moment nonetheless, a tiny rocky ledge, over looking a full moon rising above the Pacific Ocean, a stream of water cascading over the edge. Inpenetrable bush all around us. Just as our hopes were failing, we saw the light of a fire in the distance along the beach…the campsite! With renewed fervour we went back into the bushes, trying to stick close to the edge. Soon it became apparent we were TOO close to the cliff edge, and we were now traversing virtually vertical terrain hanging on bushes and trees. Not good. So we cut inland again. Another 30mins or so of this, and we came back out to the beach, descending the near vertical terrain through thick, thick bushes. The bushes stopped, and revealed the beach below beneath another vertical cliff. But it was impossible to determine how far down it was. It was too dark. I couldn’t get my flashlight out, I was hanging on a tree in a precarious position. I guessed the sand was somewhere between 10feet and 30feet below me. Climbing back up would have been virtually impossible, whereas just dropping to the sand would put us on the beach and within easy walking of the campsite! I elected to drop. It turned out to be around an 18 feet drop. A fair way with a 25kg backpack in the dark. Jane then followed down behind me. We’d made it! We could see the fires further along the beach. Home. Although we did still have the erie experience of nearly walking straight into a huge rotting sea-lion carcass that was on the beach. A good bear attractant I imagine. The easy 2km hike had taken us 3 1/2 hours, and I was more physically exhausted than from any other hike I’ve ever done. Camping at Mystic is on the beach.

Day 2 - 19km

Frm Mystic Beach it is an easy 7km to Bear Beach winding through beautiful trees over bridges and down staircases carved from trees (they’re pretty cool!). It was a relief to be on a trail again. At Bear Beach there is another campsite, but we just elected to have some lunch and press on to the next (smaller) campsite at Chin Beach. The 12km from Bear Beach to Chin Beach were tough, especially considering the bushwacking the day before and the 7km we had done already. There are some gruelling climbs (one particular 135m one) and steep descents for the whole 12km. It’s very energy sapping, but still through some nice forest. When you finally arrive at an emergency shelter in the trees you know it’s all downhill and you’re nearly there.

Chin Beach has a number of camping places nestled in the trees right on the beach side, but sheltered from the wind. It’s a gorgeous spot. Water is available from a small, waterfall at the South end. Camping spots are kind of limited though.

We enjoyed some reading in the evening sun, had a hearty meal and then enjoyed a gorgeous sunset over the Pacific.

Check out part II of the Juan de Fuca trail report for the rest.

Length: 26.6km Elevation: 1400m - 2480m (2700m+ if you scramble peaks)
Time: 3 Days
Effort: Medium (some long uphill).
Rating: 7.5/10

26.6km over 3 days?! Well that’s what the book told me. “If you are strong and very, very fast this hike can be done in two days”. Hmmmm. I would say if you were strong and very, very fast you could do this in ONE day. Two days is relaxing. Three days is extreme. I read a whole brand new boook from cover to cover, did three separate sidetrips scrambling up 3 mountains, wasted tonnes of time stalking marmots and goats. Invented games with stones. Etc. Lets just say I had some time to kill. And I still only took 2 1/2 days.

So Canada Day 2007 has come and gone, but my post for the long weekend is 2 months behind schedule.

Originally I was planning to go rock climbing in a place near Golden, B.C. for 3 days with a bunch of friends. But my poor, poor fingers were over-tired from too much indoor climbing and I fancied having some time alone. So I got them to drop me off along the David Thompson (Highway 11) on their way to Golden. They would (hopefully) return in 3 days to pick me up.

I got dropped off at the trailhead at 10pm in the pouring rain and decided to camp right there, which was right next to a garbage damp (fenced at least). Smart huh? Anyhoo, no bears turned up, but the banging of the huge metal door drove me nuts and I started hiking at 5am the next morning because I couldn’t sleep.

The first 8km of trail are kind of boring as they pass through wooded terrain on a seismic-line/quad trail. The result was that I found myself halfway though the hike and at my campsite in a secluded alpine meadow by 10am. This is a gorgeous area once you escape the trees and you enter a lovely alpine bowl at around 2400m. I passed the next few days on my own reading in the sun (wrapped in a -10C sleeping bag in the sun!), scrambling the three surrounding 2700m peaks, and watching my marmot and squirrely friends at play.

The best peak to scramble is Littlehorn it’s self, the one directly across from you as you crest the first pass. From the second pass, amble up steep grassy slopes to your right until you attain the ridge and then it’s easy scrambling (hands in pockets style) to the top. From here you can actually continue into a ridge walk, descending steep talus on the far side following the ridge over another couple of humps until you carefully pick your way down steep grassy slopes at the far end.

The photo shows the trail in green…the scrambling route I took in red, and two optional descents in yellow. The route I took down was not ideal, ending at cliffs in two different places and involving some backtracking up steep slopes to find a way off. The yellow routes LOOKED bettter, but no guarantees!The other two peaks I ascended (OK, one I didn’t make it to the true top) were the ones either side of the first pass. As you approach the pass from the start of the hike, the summit to the left is inaccessible except to CRAZY scramblers. You can ascend the steep, loose scree slope to the ridge easily enough, and you are treated with nice views off the the precipitous farside, but to travel to the true summit would involve some crazy exposure and difficult climbing. The summit on the right of the pass is somewhat easier to obtain up slightly less steep scree along the ridge edge.

All was perfect except for the two nights. I only had the fly of tent, not the inner. So when a scratching woke me up in the middle of the first night, I found my nose inches from the face of an inquisitive ground squirrel. He ran away. Then came back REPEATEDLY all damn night to nibble on my stuff. I even resorted to (gently) swatting him (sorry animal lovers) to scare him off. He was unperturbed. I zipped my sleeping bag up fully, scared he was going to run inside and cause havoc (can you imagine a toothy, excited, nut-loving squirrel loose in a tight fitting mummy bag? yikes)

I woke up the next morning, to find he had run away with one of my gloves. Leaving me with a freezing left-hand in extremely windy sub-zero conditions. I hope he made good use of it. To cap the night off, i found the squirrely b******s had also got into my food, which I’d hung of the highest boulder I could find.

The next night was not much better, with Mr Glove Lover returning (presumably for the right-hand) at regular intervals. The highlight though was when I woke up at 8am to find a MARMOT sat nibbling grass within my tent, 5 inches from my face. I was very amused and watched him for a few minutes, until he turned his attention to my sleeping bag, then he got the boot from my tent too (not literally).

Other highlights were watching the marmots ‘box’ over territory, seeing the TINIEST baby mountain goats, and waiting 7 hours for my friends to pick me up after the hike. Wait…that wasn’t a highlight. Thanks guys!