By Keith
and Heather Nicol
Our daughter Kristie and her boyfriend Eric
are visiting from Vancouver and love hiking in Strathcona Park when they visit.
Last year they did the Lake Helen Mackenzie and Battleship Lake loop so this
time we decided to do the Croteau Lake trail on Tuesday, August 24. Unlike the trail they did last year which is a
loop this is an in and out trail. We started from an informal trail along the
access road to Raven Lodge and this reduced our distance to the Croteau Lake by
about 1 km. Via this route the distance was about 5.4 km 1 way and this took us about 1 hour and 40 minutes to
get in which included stopping for pictures in several places.
Battleship Lake (Eric and Kristie( with the runs of Mt Washington in the distance
Along
the way the trail passes by Battleship Lake other scenic lakes like Kooso and
Lady Lake before climbing to Croteau lake. The trail is in good shape with some
roots and rocks to contend with in places. Croteau Lake is home to a large camp
site and we ate lunch on one of the unoccupied tent platforms. Surprisingly there
were no campers at any of the tent platforms while we were there. The lake
faces Mt Albert Edward which means that campers have a picturesque backdrop for
their overnight experience (see photo below). We could have continued on to Kwai Lake but we
opted to return via the same route we hiked in on. Croteau Lake makes a fine
10.8 km outing. We were amazed at the
wide range of hikers doing this trail from families with young children to
small groups of seniors out for a hike on a nice summer day. For more
information see: http://bcparks.ca/explore/parkpgs/strath/
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