Blog
First Backcountry Camping trip!
September 06, 2023 to September 08, 2023
Up until this point of my life I have wanted to try backcountry camping, but still had never done it.
Lucky for me, Rachel had reserved campsites for the Skoki loop which you have to reserve at the beginning of the year because they get completely booked right when they are available.
Which means my first backcountry camping experience gets to be pretty amazing!
We stayed in Lake Louise the night before so we could get an early start, and when we woke up it was pouring rain.
After waiting a bit hoping it would lessen, we headed to the trailhead to push through the weather!
The beginning of this hike is along a service road that feels like it goes on forever. The whole way up it rained, and as we got farther along we started passing people coming back down. Everyone we passed was saying that the first mountain pass we had to go through was in complete whiteout conditions, many of their backpacks were still covered in snow. Even people that were going to be staying at the same site as us that night were turning around and bailing on the trip because the campsite was covered in snow. Given that we were in the mountains, we decided to keep hiking because who knows what the weather would do and we could always turn around later!
It was a good thing we did push through and ignore the people turning around, because when we emerged from the service road and trees to the first clearing where the views start, the weather switched to blue skies and beautiful!
With the better weather, we took a detour to an absolutely gorgeous lake for a break.
Halfway through the first day, and I was obviously feeling so good. packing for 3 days is an awful lot heavier then just 1 🤣
Back on the trail very motivated to get to the first campsite!
We made it to the first campsite, and all the snow had melted, woohoo! We had our dehydrated meals, which obviously tasted amazing after hiking 15km with 706 metres of elevation gain. Then I got to put our food up in my first bear hang :P
First night in the cozy tent playing some games.
In the morning, we walked down to the lake we were camped next to and admired the view, then filtered some water for the day.
And we are off on day 2! this is the easiest of the 3 days because theres only a few hundred metres of elevation gain.
We made it to campsite 2, setup our hammocks and hung out reading for a bit.
And the final day begins! I was very amused by this fork in the road sign :P
It wasn't larch season yet, but as we got near this waterfall, we started seeing some larches changing colour!
The trail goes up somewhere in the wall, but we totally missed it and ended up doing a scramble up the other side to get to the top.
The whole hike is incredible, but day 3 is something else. There were two lakes that you hike past, and the colour of both are incredible! This is a view of the first one from the top of the hill we scrambled up, and you can kinda see how it feeds the waterfall.
Still the first lake, but from when we got to the shore line.
Still the first lake, but my favourite view, I could have stayed here all day and it's also where we decided to have lunch.
and the second lake! Another amazing blue lake with a waterfall in the background. This is where we started the last chunk of elevation gain to make it over deception pass
The view from the top of deception pass! It's all downhill from here, and our minds have definitely started to imagine the food we are going to have for dinner.
After 3 days, 45km, and over 1200 metres of elevation gain... this burger was incredible :D I am immediately hooked, and definitely need to start planning more trips!
