Alice Lake....

Last weekend we took an overnight trip to Alice Lake provincial park. This is part of our new master plan:...get out of town as much as possible to save ourselves weekends full of chores. And it's a great plan. Alice Lake is very close to Vancouver, only 90 minutes up the gorgeous sea to sky highway. It was a drizzly, cool weekend, but that wasn't going to stop us. We didn't have a reservation (there are a few first come-first served spots) and got a so-so site. The site was huge but not as treed-in as we usually like. We prefer a smaller site, more wooded and set back further from the road, but it was okay.

We had a good trip, even though Alice Lake is not quite our style of camping. It's a busy, manicured park and I cannot imagine what it is like in summer. I envisage hundreds of people leaving their downtown condos and getting "away from it all" by going to the most over-crowded and manicured campground they can find. We usually avoid any sites with tiled showers and automatic hand-dryers...to put it bluntly...it's camping for people who don't really enjoy camping. There's no worries about bears...we were hard pressed to find any wildlife, other than a recalcitrant robin looking for tidbits. Even the raccoons seem to think it was a bit too much. And $30/night is a bit steep. I know I sound a bit grumpy about it. It's actually a lovely place, but there were some cons.

But we did do a lovely easy hike around stump lake. It took us an hour (bear in mind our 3 and half year old son, and our 14 year old dog were ambling along). It was easy and very pleasant and the kids loved it. We passed by some fantastic stumps; examples of the old growth forest it must once have been. One can only imagine what the size of this tree was before it was felled.

So there's pros and cons to Alice Lake. Proximity to the city is definitely a plus. There are some lovely hikes and the scenery is beautiful. The lake is pretty and swimable. However, I think we'll only use Alice Lake for the odd overnight getaway in Spring and Fall. 

On the way back we took a quick look at Shannon Falls. The Falls are quite spectacular, even though it's a very touristy spot (quite close to the city). I'm surprised I haven't been to see them before now! Bronwyn stood looking up at the falls and declared in awe, "It's glorious!"