Ring Lake Backpacking Trip

April 28, 2021April 23, 2021 / Maria / 1 Comment

Ring Lake was definitely one of the weirder backpacking trips I’ve been on over the years, but I look back on it now with very fond memories. It was August 2018, the smokiest summer I’ve ever experienced in the lower mainland. My Howe Sound Crest trip had been cancelled for the second year running because of the smoke, but I still wanted to go out exploring somewhere, so Brandon and I decided to head up towards Whistler in hopes that the smoke would thin.

If anything it was worse in Whistler, but we carried on towards Callaghan Lake, pulling over just before the lake at the Conflict Lake/Ring Lake trailhead. Callaghan is most well known for its cross country skiing, but you can explore there in the summer as well. It’s a gravel road that’s in pretty rough shape; I think it’s doable in a 2WD because there aren’t many water bars, but high clearance definitely make it easier.

The Conflict Lake trail is really popular in the winter because there’s a beautiful cabin you can ski into and explore the area from, but for some reason it’s not operating in the summer and we didn’t see a single person on the trail. It’s 5km to Conflict Lake along relatively flat terrain through the woods. I had a bit of an upset tummy, so we rushed along to the Lake, thinking there would be an outhouse near the cabin. But alas, it’s too swanky a cabin for that so I was forced to make use of my trowel.

We had lunch at the lake before carrying on to Ring Lake, which is another 5km, but this time it’s all uphill. It’s about 500 metres in elevation gain, but since it was flat to Conflict Lake, all the elevation is in the second half of the trail. However, right after Conflict Lake there are some really beautiful meadows, and just our luck they were filled with wildflowers! The contrast of the green meadows and smoke filled valley made me feel like I was somewhere else entirely. Coupled with the fact that we had yet to see another soul on the trail, it was quite blissful.

It’s a tiring climb up from there though. The trail skirts the edge of the valley as you climb up towards the lake. It’s almost totally in the trees until you reach the top and pop out in the alpine. When I did Brew Lake it reminded me a lot of Ring Lake because both trails are almost completely forested until you reach the top, and both weirdly empty.

The challenge of Ring Lake is that about halfway between Conflict and Ring, you have to do a pretty dicey river crossing. Because of the terrain, the river cascades down over the rocks at a pretty steep angle, making it dangerous if you were to misstep and fall in. For this reason, the season during which you can hike to Ring Lake is short because you need to wait until the flows in the river goes down. I had a friend that tried to go in July once and had to turn around at the river crossing, so I’d really only recommend going in August. Fortunately for us (I guess), it was a super dry year, so we didn’t have too much trouble. I just opted to wear my full goretex boots for the trip and brought two hiking poles instead of the one I normally bring to make the crossing easier (although I ended up giving the second one to Brandon).

After the crossing the trail is still quite technical though, there are a few ladder and rope sections, but eventually you pop out of the trees to the most gorgeous mountain vista! Sadly though, with the smoke we could barely see across the lake, but the whole area is hemmed in by mountains and it looked like there was lots to explore nearby. When we arrived we saw one tent on the far side of the lake, so we went in the other direction to set up our camp. It’s a large lake, so by the time we found a place we liked, we couldn’t even see them anymore. They left before us the following morning and we didn’t see a single other person the whole weekend.

There’s only a handful of times when we’ve had such solitude at a campsite. I love it, but it does make you much more keenly aware of your presence in the wilderness. Ring Lake is in grizzly bear country, so caching our food was super important. Unfortunately though, it’s also an alpine environment and trees were very sparse. There are some around, but they’re the kind that go straight up with very few branches from which to hang a bear cache. After pitching the tent, we immediately got to work on our bear cache because we knew it would take some time. Looking back, I really have no idea how we managed to get the thing up – it took us about an hour, but somehow Cowboy Brandon managed to lasso to trees and we created a clothesline between them that we then hoisted our bags up. Most challenging was making sure not to tie the ropes in such a way that we wouldn’t be able to get them back, but in the end it all worked out. Definitely the most impressive bear cache I’ve ever fashioned. It was higher than it looks in the photo (because it was taken on a slope), but it did start to sag overnight.

I’d also brought some bear bangers in case we saw a grizzly and I’d been thinking of setting one off before bed just to make sure the area was clear, but there is a small chance of fire with bangers and flares, so I opted not to with the forest so dry. Instead we just kept our bear horns nearby and we ended up sleeping with the fly off the tent, so we could easily see the surrounding area with the moonlight. I’m not really sure why we left the fly off, I think Brandon wanted to watch the stars, but with so much smoke, there wasn’t really much to see overnight. We did get a beautiful orange sunset over the lake though!

I think what makes this trip stick out in my mind so much was the rest of the evening. After we’d set up camp, we went downwind of our tent to make dinner. Brandon had brought his speaker so that we could play music to scare off the bears and we’d accidentally brought a pretty significant amount of fireball with us. So we ended up doing quite a few shots and having our own mountain dance party as we made dinner! There’s nothing so enjoyable as a watching the sun go down with Brandon’s backcountry thai chicken curry and a pleasant buzz. But mostly we just marveled in our good fortune in having such a beautiful place all to ourselves.

We both regret that we couldn’t explore the area further. There are lots of surrounding mountain peaks that would have made for a fun second day, but the smoke stole any hope of a view, so we decided to just head back down the following day, though we’re both keen to return again in the future.

The trek down was a lot more enjoyable than the hike up. We did a small bit of exploring at the meadows at the top before heading back to Conflict Lake for lunch again. There’s a boulder field between Ring and Conflict Lake that is an excellent place to watch for marmots. We saw a few on the way up hanging out on the rocks. Then on the way back down I counted a record 7 marmots out sunning themselves! One was a family of 4 with two little pups that were super cute!

It’s only 10km each way, but it feels like a long 10km with big hiking packs. The hike from Conflict back to the car felt like it went on forever and we were relieved when we finally arrived back at the car and could shed our packs and smelly clothes. Like I said, I really would like to go back and visit Ring Lake again, but I would never do it in such conditions. Looking back, the smoke was great enough that we shouldn’t have gone hiking at all and I’m impressed I didn’t feel sick from it.

We had some really bad smoke in Sept. 2020 as well and again attempted to escape it by heading out of the city. We weren’t successful in escaping it, but on this occasion it gave me such a headache I quit the hike 3km in and went back to the car. When the smoke is so bad, it’s really not worth going out in it since it’s quite dangerous to your health. At the time though, we’d been cooped up for the better part of a month and were going a little stir crazy. It’s a difficult hike, don’t underestimate it – but in different conditions, I would gladly return!

Kayaking Jug Island

April 21, 2021April 6, 2021 / Maria / 4 Comments

Seth and I started kayaking a few years ago in an effort to find a hobby that we both enjoyed. I love backpacking and camping and Seth likes hiking and camping, but he does not really like backpacking. Seth kayaked with his family as a kid and liked it, so I thought touring with sea kayaks might be a good shared hobby for us because we could get out in nature and go camping without having to carry packs. Turns out it was a great idea and we both loved it! We took a kayaking basics course in 2018 and have gone on a 3-day trip every year since, so this year we decided to get ourselves a pair of kayaks!

Kayaks are definitely not cheap and have a lot of costs that come along with them (roof rack, paddles, PFDs, skirts, etc). To date we’ve always rented kayaks, and while that’s not cheap either, you can still go on quite a few trips before it approaches the cost of buying your own. But we’d like to start doing day and evening paddles as well, so we decided it was worth the money and are super excited about our new boats! We got them at Skyview Outdoor Store in Surrey, which I would highly recommend. We both got Boreal Storm 16 kayaks, which means they are 16 foot long sea touring kayaks. To differentiate between the two, I got a yellow one and Seth got red.

We took them out on their maiden voyage over the Easter weekend in early April. We wanted to launch from the Belcarra picnic area, but we were a little too late getting started on Easter Sunday and couldn’t find parking, so instead we took them over to Sasamat Lake. It’s a nice little lake and it was fun to test them out there, but it’s a bit on the small side, so we returned to Belcarra early on Easter Monday to kayak to Jug Island. If you’re planning to explore (by foot or boat) from the picnic area, arriving early is a must as its a small parking lot and Metro Vancouver does close the road once it’s full. They have also introduced pay parking this year for $2 an hour. There is an upside though – you can get public transit to both Sasamat Lake at Belcarra from Moody Centre!

We had absolutely perfect weather for it on the day we went – blue skies with a dead calm on the water. I really like Belcarra Regional Park and I’ve hiked out to Jug Island a few times. It’s only a 5km hike, so I recommend checking it out on foot if you’re in the area, but this time I definitely preferred visiting by boat! We took our time paddling up the coast looking at all the giant homes along the water. It has a very urban feel until you reach the end of the peninsula, but once you round the corner you can see Jug Island and up Indian Arm and it feels much more remote.

We paddled around Jug Island and then pulled into the little beach at the end of the trail to have a snack. We didn’t see any other paddlers on the way out, but there were already quite a few hikers enjoying the view. We paddled a little further up to take a peak into Bedwell Bay and get some photos up Indian Arm before turning around and heading back. We saw a lot more paddlers on our way back and round trip it was about 7km of paddling. With the break at the beach looking towards Jug Island, I thought this was a really good half day beginner paddle!

Going in April though, you definitely need to play close attention to the weather conditions and dress for it. It was a gorgeous sunny day when we went and Seth even kayaked just in a t-shirt for part of it, but the water is freezing, so I had a merino layer under my waterproof jacket and gloves and headband to keep my ears warm (plus extra fleece layers in my dry bag). I’m planning to invest in some neoprene booties next because the water is cold on your feet so early in the season!

Now that we have kayaks, I’ll likely be posting a lot more content about kayaking. We have a few ideas for where we’d like to take them this year, but since we’re still new to the kayaking scene, would love to hear anyone else’s recommendations! Like I said, we have the Sea Kayaking Basics course from Paddle Canada, but we’re planning to upgrade to their Level 1 course soon to grow our knowledge and be more prepared on the water.

Looking forward to lots of new adventures!

Cheakamus Lake Backpacking Trip

April 14, 2021March 16, 2021 / Maria / 6 Comments

After two May Long weekend trips to Lindeman Lake, we decided to try Cheakamus Lake in 2019. Our group continued to grow and this time we had 11 people join us for the adventure!

The one challenge with going to Cheakamus Lake is that it’s in Garibaldi Park, which means you have to reserve the campsites in advance. There are two sites to choose from, the bigger Cheakamus Lake Campsite at the head of the lake, or the smaller Singing Creek Campsite in the middle of the lake. Both campgrounds are really nice. The sites at Cheakamus Lake are more isolated and are spread out along the lakefront, so if you’re only booking one site, I’d recommend here as it’s a lot more private. At Singing Creek, there’s a lovely beach on which to hang out, but the sites are all clustered together in the woods, so it was prefect for as a large group! Several groups day hiked into the beach throughout the weekend, but otherwise we were the only ones who camped there overnight.

We met at the trailhead on Saturday morning and started hiking together, though with so many of us, we quickly became scattered along the trail. It’s 4km to the first site and then another 4km to the second site. It’s mostly flat along the trail, so it’s a great hike for early in the season, and for beginners. Since it was an easier trail, I finally convinced Seth to join us for the weekend and Megan third wheeled with us in the tent.

We took a short break at the first site, but otherwise had a steady pace to the end of the trail. I think it took us about 2.5 hours to make the trek. We set up tents among the trees and spent the rest of the day lounging on the beach. The weather forecast had been a bit mixed and the first day was supposed to be the best, so we decided to make a go for our annual May swim in the lake! Me and Carolyn were the first to make a quick dive in and out of the water and about half of the group joined us. Steve made a half hearted run up to his knees and then turned immediately turned back without regret, whereas Seth’s approach was to prolong the agony with a slow wade in. Me and Emily went for a second swim the following day, but no one was quite so dedicated to swimming as Lien. He must have been in and out of the frigid water at least 3-4 times throughout the weekend!

Cheakamus Lake was a cool place, but the downside is that once you get to Singing Creek, there’s not really anywhere else to explore. We had a whole day to kill on Sunday, so most of us slept in, although some more than others (looking at you Meg). Carolyn and Tiiu took us by surprise by deciding to get up and go trail running up towards Helm Creek after breakfast. Carolyn came over to give me her trip plan in case they didn’t return (to which Steve was a little offended, but eventually agreed he’d rather not assume any responsibility in Carolyn’s rescue if things went awry).

But I had to laugh at Carolyn when she told me they were going to go up towards Helm Creek and Black Tusk. Before leaving she asked me whether I thought there would be snow on the trail, to which I needed only to point across the lake to where you could clearly see the snow atop the mountain to answer the question. She looked a little abashed and just agreed they’d turn around when they hit the snow.

I was a little disappointed not to have been invited on this outing (I mean, why would I, I’m not a trail runner), so I decided to rally the troops for a little bushwacking. It did look as if the trail continued further up the lake into the woods, so we decided to follow it. The trail deteriorated pretty fast and while it was in no way a reliable or groomed trail, it was still there, so we continued on up the lake through the trees. It did involve a bit of wayfinding, but we just made sure to stick close to the shoreline and track our progress on my GPS.

From our beach, you can see another bigger beach at the end of the lake, and I was determined to get there. The closer we got to the end of the lake, the trail turned into more of an animal path before finally disappearing altogether. We continued on for a bit, but eventually had to conclude that there was a marsh standing between us at the beach at the foot of the lake. We did make it all the way to the end of the lake, but there was simply no way (that we could find) across the bog, so we decided to turn back.

Meg slept through this little adventure and Brandon made the trek all the way back to his car in search of warmer bedding (apparently it’d been a cold night). We returned sometime after lunch and Carolyn and Tiiu reappeared mid afternoon. We went for another swim and then played a few games of crib (of course Steve had brought a travel size board in his bag of wonders).

We’d been expecting rain, but it continued to hold off. We set up a few tarps in the woods just in case, which was an even more effective way to keep the rain away because after that it never materialized at all! We enjoyed a smorgasbord of dinners over the two days. I teamed up with Brandon and he made us thai chicken curry the first night, followed by my potato chili and apple crumble the second night. Emily had spaghetti, which involved an entire can of tomato sauce (so heavy!) and Carolyn, Tiiu, Meg, and Steve teamed up to make a pretty fancy looking charcuterie board.

Our May Long weekend trip is always centered on sharing and comradery, so I loved just hanging out on the beach and taking it easy with my friends, something that seems even more special after a year of Covid isolation. I spent a lot of time chilling in the hammock and felt especially lucky to be accompanied by both Seth and Emily on this trip. We were treated to a particularly lovely sunset over the lake on the first evening and then hit the sack early after that.

On Monday we packed up and headed back out the trail. It rained on me, Seth, and Lien for no more than 10 minutes, and it seemed to have been pretty localized as no one else reported seeing rain at all. so overall it was another successful trip and I’d definitely recommend it as a great backpacking trip for beginners!