Joffre Lakes Provincial Park Solo Hike & Camp

Hi everyone. Well Mickey and Finch and I are out camping this weekend, but for this video what we thought we'd show you is a backpacking trip I did about a week ago up to an area called Joffrey Lakes. Joffrey Lakes is about an hour north of Whistler and it's just a gorgeous beautiful area. So no van this time, just some hiking, some camping and some amazing views. Hope you enjoy the video. This is called Devil's Club, it's something very unpleasant to hike around. Just starting to bloom. You can see some snow still in the trees here. Elevation here is quite high, just near the lower lake. Stairway to heaven, but it feels just about as steep. Coming up on Second Lake I think, or less than 2k I think from the parking lot. The last kilometer, steep. Steep trail, steep stairs. Second Lake, unfortunately it's closed right now down there, so we'll see if the trail gets a little closer, but what a beautiful view. Third lake's up over there. Amazing views in any direction. Just gorgeous. There's the washroom, up high, really high, probably because of the snow. Flush toilet, let's check it out. Flush toilet. A very rocky and rough route if you need to go to the washroom from the campsite. See the food cache up over there. Looks like the lakeside spots are already all taken, that's not a big surprise. But a first come first serve once you have a reservation, you do need a reservation to camp here. So these ones are up amongst the rock. Alright, my home for the evening. Not too bad. I didn't get one of the water spots, but I'm not going to complain. Just gorgeous. Glacier. I think the mountain directly ahead of me is actually Mount Joffrey. Beautiful waterfall. Up that way I think is Mount Machay. I've actually climbed back on that glacier behind that mountain you see in front. Letting Mickey know that I'm OK, just sending her a quick little satellite I'm OK message. Unfortunately she doesn't get to share the view at the same time. So beautiful. just amazing. Look at this view. So nice. Almost looks like someone skied down there. Rugged glacier up there. Beautiful actually. Nice way to get up to that glacier would be to go right up that gully. Just gorgeous. What an amazing place to spend an evening. My tent? Well, it's over there somewhere. The trail there is kind of anywhere you can get between the rocks. Little after nine, I think I'll step a little bit longer, but I likely will be in bed very shortly. My ninja skills are coming in very handy, at least my ninja balancing skills. So my first time in my new tent. Actually this whole trip has been new gear. I've got a new backpack, new tent, and new sleeping bag actually. All of which, each one weighs under two pounds. So my base backpacking weight was actually about six pounds. So my pack was really light. Of course you've got water and some food and things like that, but because I'm only here for one night, I'm keeping it very light. It sort of looks like Blair Witch sort of thing happening. Anyway, yeah, just a gorgeous spot. I can hear the birds, waterfall behind me. I got in about 4.30, got up to the campground a little bit after 6. I thought I'd be the last one, but two couples came in after me actually. One couple just a few minutes ago as it was getting dark. They've got I think one or two spots left and that's it. Nice trail in. You know, you hit the first lake in the first couple of minutes. The second lake is a couple of kilometers in and part of it is the second k is steep and long. It's an easy trail in terms of technical difficulty, but it's fairly hard and you get probably half hour or so and you're at the third lake. Once you actually get to the main part of the lake, it's still about a kilometer, which takes maybe 20 minutes to walk around to where the campground is. I haven't been here in a long time and they've improved the trail a lot and they've got a nice washroom, although it's kind of funny because your campsites are here, a reasonable distance to walk, and you've got to cross a creek on some of the wet, slippery rocks. But there might actually be a few campsites just on the other side of the washroom, but there's a helicopter pad there, but I don't know. I didn't check it out. Most people seem to be over here in part, I think, just because you get this fantastic view. You've got the mountains behind you, which are stunning. And then you get to look out over the lake and a really nice sunset this evening. So it's supposed to be cool tonight, maybe down to five degrees. But four days ago, it was still freezing up here at night. So five degrees is pretty good. And I've got this sleeping bag, I think is going to be fine in that weather. And I was going to actually do a sort of gear review of everything I purchased, the tent, the backpack, and the sleeping bag, but I forgot some extra batteries. I'm doing this on my camera right now, simply because my other camera batteries are almost dead. And I brought some, I had some spares, and I set them on the table, and I left the house without them, which is unfortunate. That's what happens when Mickey's not doing the checklist for me. Well, good morning, everyone. Just a gorgeous night here last night. Beautiful stars, sound of the water rushing on the waterfall behind us, a little bit of rockfall on occasion. Just gorgeous. I got a little chilly in my tent, but that's because I brought a really light sleeping bag. This is about 6.30 in the morning right now. Some people were up a little earlier. I was up about, I slept in till a little after five, so just caught the sunrise coming up on the mountains, actually to the west, because the sun comes up over here on the east and you won't see it over the glacier until probably, I don't know, a little while yet, but you can see it on the mountains across the way. So just gorgeous. Anyway, I'm going to head out, take my time, kind of explore a little bit, like I'm in this rock field right now, and then head home. It's been a very enjoyable short trip. I do want to come back with my pack raft. I can't, I can't see that lake and not want to come up here and do a paddle at one point. Just gorgeous. It's starting to warm up too, and the mosquitoes are out, which wasn't a problem when I was in our campsite. I think down by the water, you'd get a lot more mosquitoes than we did up on that ridge, which was right over there. It's about 7.30 in the morning. Sun here won't come over the glacier until probably another hour or two, I think, and by then it'll be really busy, lots of people coming up and down the trail. I think it's actually the busiest trail on any park in British Columbia, which is why you have to have reservations in advance. Anyway, it's nice to chat with some of the fellow campers. Everyone's just amazed when they're camping here. It's just so beautiful. Well, I hope you enjoyed this video, and if you did, please give us a thumbs up, and if you haven't subscribed, please do so, and we'll see you next time.