Category Archives: Strathcona Park

Trip Report – Century Sam Lake – 13 July 2024

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Five of us hiked to the picture postcard called Century Sam Lake.  It’s named after a character that Sid Williams played.  Must have been quite a character to have a lake like this named after him.  We wanted to hike to it when it was in full sunshine, to show off the deep blue-green.  The trade off was that it was very hot.  But the crowd that was there was fully into swimming and diving off cliffs, so it was perfect weather – cloudless, a bit of breeze.  The Lake is located below the Comox Glacier.  This contributes to the other attraction of this hike which is the ice cave.  It wasn’t as good as on a previous trip, maybe too early in the season, but still very interesting.  And the wildflowers were excellent.

The Lake is in Strathcona Park, but the approach is not.  Trail maintenance is ambiguous, but someone had just clipped the aggressive brush, including Devil’s Club, so that was good.  The route is rough everywhere and steep in the headwall up to the Lake.  The access to this trail is on a logging road through Mosaic lands and the gate is only unlocked on weekends and only when Mosaic is not logging and the fire danger is low.  We timed it well, so all was good.  (11.3 km; 7.5 hours; 423 m elevation gain)

Norris 

Thanks to Louise, Jim and Norris for the photos

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Hiking -Century Sam Lake – 13 July 2024

Hiking – Century Sam – 13 July 2024

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Updated!

Activity Hiking
Destination Century Sam Lake
Date 13 July Saturday; this date is still somewhat tentative for weather and for Mosaic’s announcement on Thursday about the gate opening.
Trip Coordinator Norris Weimer
Contact Info norris.weimer@ualberta.ca; 250-285-3710.  Please let the coordinator know if you are interested by Wednesday, 10 July.
Description This trip is hard to schedule because it needs good weather and the access is through a gate which is only unlocked for 12 hours on Saturday and on Sunday.  Once passed the gate, the access is via a logging road which eventually has water bars.  The hike itself is on a heavily used, but not really maintained trail.  The creek crossings are on logs.  To the lake is about 8.3 km (return) and 400m elevation gain; to the ice caves is about 13.6 km (return) and 570m elevation gain. The hiking time may be about 7 hours. The trail will likely be very busy.
Meeting Place QCove ferry terminal
Departure Time 7:00  am ferry
Difficulty
 Challenging for the length of the day, elevation and altitude gain.
Costs Ferry, shared fuel costs.
Trip limits Limits may depend on the vehicles going.
Dogs? No
Notes: We will not do this trip in poor weather.  This is a long day.  Come prepared for mountain conditions.

Trip Report – Mt. Washington – 6 Mar 2024

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This date was originally scheduled for a moderate hike, but the recent snow on Quadra made that a sketchy plan, so we opted to take advantage of the recent weather and snowshoe at Mt. Washington.  The mountain and Forbidden Plateau still don’t have the snow pack they normally would at this time, but the conditions were absolutely perfect for us.  The snow was light and powdery, still hanging on the trees.  The sunshine made it feel warmer than it was.

With eight participants and modest ambitions, we started out on Tree Beard’s Trail, enjoying the slight rise to a viewpoint on a bluff.  We continued on the Crooked Creek Trail, stopping for lunch in the open, overlooking the snow-covered Paradise Meadows.  When that trail turned back, we decided to extend the outing by using the Old Cabin Loop as a connector back to the Tree Beard’s Trail.  From there we retraced our route back to Raven Lodge.  Half of the group stayed a bit longer to socialize at the Lodge.

This was a beautiful day with perfect conditions.  (4.4 km, 2¼ hours)

Debbie

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Snow – Mt. Washington – 6 Mar 2024