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Wednesday 15 September 2010

getting out of the city: Howe Sound Crest Trail


Vistas on the Howe Sound Crest Trail




The Howe Sound Crest Trail (HSCT) is literally 45 minutes away from Vancouver. The southern trail head starts at Cypress Provincial Park (local ski mountain) and ends in Porteau Cove, which is basically halfway between Vancouver and Squamish. It is about 30 km long and most people hike it in 2 days. The HSCT can be done in a day (10 or more hours of fast walking). There is a detailed route description at clubtread.com. The official park site has more info about the area.

We went southbound, I recommend to go northbound though. The trail markers are way better to spot heading north. The HSCT is probably one of the best short hikes near Vancouver. We did it in late August 2010.

More pictures are here.


Our actual plan for the summer was to finish the Stein Valley traverse from last year, but unfortunately my friend had hurt his knee 2 weeks before that planed trip. Hiking just on my own in Grizzly country wasn't my thing. I did the North Coast Trail instead (read my last 2 posts if you would like to know more about those hikes).  But we decided to do a shorter and less demanding trip near Vancouver. As we had time and the forecast didn't look to bad, we packed food for 3 days and planed to have enough time to enjoy the views. It turned out to be a wise choice. The Howe Sound Crest is absolutely gorgeous and awarding!
 
A friend drove us to close Porteau Cove and we got of on the Highway. Just the drive is great. The Sound, Islands and big mountains to our right side. We had to gain almost 1000 meters on our first day.
view of the Howe Sound

Well, we thought to be really smart ass and take the trail near Deeks creek, which is closer to Vancouver, instead of choosing the official route. It wasn't the best decision. We had to find the right way up the mountain to get on to the Howe Sound Crest Trail. We had plenty of time and the weather was good, so it wasn't too bad to waste some time in the forest.


trying to find the right trail in the forest

We passed by a beautiful creek and waterfall, unfortunately I did not take a picture of it for some reason. Deeks Lake was reached after approx. 4 hours and we had a little break. It is possible to camp here, but it was bug infested and some people thought it was nice to leave a fish can with leftovers in the fireplaces. Bears like such people, I reckon.

Deeks Lake

It is a gorgeous spot, mist clouded the mountains around us and the wind pushed some clouds away. Some climbing and jumping was involved to negotiate the logjams at the inlet..


logjam near the lake


Soon Middle Lake was reached. It had an amazing colour and there was also a nice waterfall further up on our way.


Middle Lake



 We arrived at Brunswick Lake at around 6pm and just had to get to the red emergency hut.


Brunswick Lake and Hut
The bugs were pretty bad and we decided to camp in our tent. It was a really great campsite with amazing views.


the Lake is divided in the middle, only separated by a tiny strip of land though

campsite


Some clouds were building up and we thought that we might not be that lucky with the weather. But this view made our day the next morning.



We had an amazing clear night sky. There was no light pollution from Vancouver, albeit we were so close to the city. It would have been wiser to sleep in the shelter, because we had massive condensation on our tent walls. The temperature dropped down to 2°C that night.

We took the Brunswick Mountain Trail to get to Magnesia Meadows for our lunch break. Every now and then vistas like these made us stop for a little bit.


Bowen Island in the middle

Horseshoe Bay in the middle, the highway is also visible

the twin peaks of the Lions in the distance, we were heading towards them

less trees and some meadows, we gained more height

tarn at Magnesia

The views were just dramatic. The hut book at the emergency shelter was checked and  we were back on the trail after a little snack. This was also the last spot to refill our water on our way for a while. It was a hot day. We climbed up to Harvey Pass and had to get through a new clearing that was caused by a forest fire a few years ago. Mount Harvey to our right side is a beautiful mountain. We had to play in some boulder fields and it became more difficult to find the trail. It is not as clearly marked going southbound. Our map confused us a bit, because it indicated us to take a route which was totally off trail. We found our way after a while though. The terrain was pretty steep and rugged.

clearing



We finally went around David Peak and could make out Hanging Lake, we were back on the right trail.


Hanging Lake

The Lions were closer now and we had our first glimpse of Vancouver. The weather and our mood was still fantastic. Just mountains, trees and the sea around us.


Vancouver in the distance

We kept going and climbed up to James Peak. It offered splendid views in all directions. We must have been at about 1300 meters. We had to be careful using the short rope attached to some rocks on the ridge line.

rope section on James Peak

one might not want to look down while crossing this section

We had to hike uphill for a while and crossed the only snowfield on our trip. A small group came the other way and they were quite surprised to meet people here. Surprisingly the HSCT is not crowded at all and rather unknown.


Enchantment Lake near Enchantment Pass
Travelling was easy for a while, till we got to this hairy peace. This trail has so much to offer. The Lions were closer now.







peak of the West Lion, we didn't have time to climb it

It was already 6:30pm and we didn't have the time to climb one of the Lions. It didn't look easy, there was a lot of loose rock and it looked slippery. The trail went right between the twin peaks of the Lions and the vista were just awesome. The echo there was also good. Due to a hot day my friend had used all his water and I borrowed him some of mine. We found a little puddle later on, though.

The pictures speak for themselves.


Howe Sound


We set up our tent on the base of the West Lion. Such a dramatic campsite. There was not too much space for our tent and some creative pitching was required. Rocks do help a lot. It might be more comfortable to just bivy here or to bring a small freestanding tent. Anyway, we had a great dinner and enjoyed the views. Vancouver was so close and yet we were in the backcountry and on our own. Such a weird and interesting feeling. This is truly one of the best campsite I have been too. Such a contrast. It got colder and a bit windier with every minute. We climbed a bit higher to get some better shots of the area.


Vancouver at night and us on the base of  West Lions Peak

We hit the sack at half past tent. Just when I closed the tent door it started to rain. We didn't expect this at all. We knew that the forecast wasn't looking that good for the next days from now on and it looked like it would stay dry for a while. But were still surprised how fast the weather had changed. It rained the whole night and it was very windy as well. Again, it was weird to be so high up and exposed to the environment, and yet so close to civilisation. We had to sleep on rock solid ground and the rain didn't stop at all. We were laying on top of a puddle the next morning. To our disadvantage the water had nowhere else to go.

not the best place to sleep
My friends groundsheet wasn't up for the task, well, he could have used it better, and he got his sleeping pad and bag wet. We could have avoided this mess with a proper groundsheet or a different campsite. Well, at least this was our last night and we would be back in the city soon. Otherwise we would have been in a pretty bad situation. The rain got stronger and doing Nr. 2 was a cold experience. It didn't look like that the conditions would improve. We just had to suck it up and packed our gear and got ready for a wet day.

no views, just a wall of fog, wind and rain

This was also the last picture I took for the rest of the day. The rain was horrendous. It didn't stop at all. I really wished that I had a waterproof camera here. There were a few tricky sections and we were hiking on the ridge line in a ocean of clouds for some hours. Just over 12 hours ago we had splendid views and now everything was white, grey and wet. Well, we weren't thirsty at least. We passed by Mount Unnecessary, put it this way, it was pretty unnecessary in those conditions. How does one come up with such a name for a mountain?

There were some chains and ropes to get up and down some big boulders. And then my friend had to learn it the hard way that his rain jacket leaked like paper in heavy rain. He got soaked to the bone. Fortunately we kept moving and we wore our fleece vests. He was kinda warm at least but probably suffered from a very mild form of hypothermia. I had fun in the rain, but he just didn't want to be in the mountains at that point. The city was close for us, in our mind. We had to hike in the rain for 5 hours till we got the Cypress Ski resort. A creek close to it was actually in flood, the water tasted good though, no filtering required. We had it and called a Taxi. It took some negotiating to get someone to pick us up. And we were 60 bucks poorer to get down to West Vancouver. It was time to board the bus to downtown. There was no traffic jam near the Lions Bridge at least. We smelled bad and most people on the bus thought we were a bit nuts. But man, we deserved a big and hot meal for dinner and just wanted to have a hot shower.

Well, it even turned out this was the most rainiest August day ever recorded in Vancouver. We really picked a good date to be in the mountains.

We did a day hike to St. Marks Summit (our last rainy part of the HSCT) almost 2 months later to see this area in the sunshine.


Anyway, the Howe Sound Crest Trail is absolutely amazing and I would like to hike it again.

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