Jul 31, 2011
This is a long but worthwhile day hike from the Berg Lake campground. Hike from the campground past Rearguard campground, the junction for Snowbird pass is well signed. The trail is well maintained and easy to follow. Junctions are well signed, the trail is well trodden and there are many cairns marking the route. The hike has several steep sections. Beautiful views of Robson glacier and it's lake, which you hike above for much of the trail. The meadows were full of marmots. There are a few creek crossings, as the it had rained all night and all morning these were running fairly high. There is one fairly wide creek as you leave the meadows before the final ascent to Snowbird pass - choose a place to cross wisely, some areas are shallower than others! There are waterfalls everywhere, particularly after the rain. The trail is mostly snow-free, there were a couple of small snow patches of snow after the meadows but these were easy to hike on with only boots. At the wide creek in the meadows you can see your final destination - it's the col on the horizon, after the first ridge you can see - took less than an hour from the creek. The final ascent up the shale slope seemed tough but I'm not sure it was the steepest - I think I just needed a snack! There are 2 routes up this slope, we took the right hand route (looking at the col) on the way up and the left hand route down, not sure it makes any difference which you take. The view of the Coleman glacier at the end was stunning, even though we had a cloudy day for the hike. Round trip took us about 8 hours including lunch and snack stops.
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