From Whitehorse down to Squamish in British Columbia (near Vancouver) is just shy of 1,500 miles. So another three day driving weekend was needed, with 10+ hours on the road each day. Rather than just reverse our northbound journey on the Alcan, we turned off at Watson Lake and took the Cassiar highway instead.
No great wildlife pictures unfortunately but we did see mooses galore, even a few bears. I’ll spare you another detailed road trip post – I tried to pick out just a few photo highlights this time – here you go.
We arrived to a drizzly overcast Squamish and that’s pretty much how it stayed. Seemed like a nice enough place, what little of it we could see through the oppressive grey clouds and relentless rain. Morning, noon and night through the week, the rain persisted.
The poor BaseCamp is a SoCal gal (like my good self), not made for this nonsense. The campsite was heavily forested, the BC tucked hiding among the trees, craving shelter from the elements. To no avail. The trees captured the rain in their leaves, collecting water more effectively than an inverted umbrella, only to hurl it down in large water bombs. The false sense of protection from the trees belied their wicked sense of humor. We patched up the worst of the BaseCamp leaks outside. Inside, the supporting cast of dishcloths, sponges and good ole kitchen roll did their bit to stem any remaining inflow.
I happily stocked up on Horlicks, mint sauce, Galaxy minstrels and sherbet lemons. No crisps but I’ve rather got a taste for Canadian crisps now anyway.
All the while, our work life continued at Aligned Collective.
And then one day, just like that, the rain stopped raining and the clouds cleared. Before our eyes, Squamish was revealed in all its glory. I did a double take. We were surrounded by mountains we didn’t even know existed.
After two weekends of heavy mileage on the road, we felt the need to stay put for a weekend – to enjoy our surroundings and get back to some of that hiking and biking we know and love. And as luck would have it, a friend of ours Martin was staying at a condo in nearby Whistler.
Which meant that the boys had each other’s company to go play at being boys on their mountain bikes. They did some hardcore trails, steep muddy single tracks and obstacles. I think they call that fun. Anyway, it freed me up nicely to go pootle around Lost Lake on wide, gentle, unassuming gravel trails. My main obstacles were unruly toddlers on rental trikes.
Some rather exceptional food and drink followed, courtesy of the Rimrock Cafe. Which is the most decent place we’ve dined out at in a long time. It is nothing like a cafe and every bit like a restaurant, the only exception being they let riff raff like us in.
Come the next day and we were delighted to find it wasn’t raining 🙂 Perfect hiking weather then! Off we popped to Joffre Lakes Provincial Park to do a steady uphill trail climb with stunning scenery, waterfalls and glacier-fed turquoise lakes.
The Joffre Lakes Trail is unsurprisingly one of the most popular hikes in the area. It’s also one of the most popular hangouts for Whiskey Jacks (also known as Canadian Jays). These grey and white feathered friends are bold yet endearing. They politely introduce themselves to tourists by landing on their outstretched arms to say “Hi”. (“Hi and what’ve you got to eat”, more like.)
After a rewarding hike and a weekend that really felt like a weekend, all that remained was to hit the brewery. A well-earned beer at The Beer Farm.
