Bella Coola-Tweedsmuir-Tsylos

[chelle]

I'm planning a 12 day hiking, camping, mountain biking, backpacking trip along highway 20 for early July. Taking the inside passage ferry up there to start the trip. Anyone have any tips about this part of BC or any must dos along the way?

[Dru]

Have fun riding your bike up the "Big Hill" If I was you I'd plan on going the other way and FINISHING at Bella Coola.

[Stuart]

Like Dru says, and take bear spray

[jmace]

I bet Bivouac.com has some info that would help you

[fern]

 

I bet you wouldn't have trouble finding someone to drive you up the big hill in their big truck. I am not sure I would want to ride a bike DOWN that hill either.

[Bill_Simpkins]

Bring a fishing pole. Piper Lake sometimes has an easy catch, or used to.

I really enjoy the Chilko Lake area if you can get down there. There are some nice trails too.

I agree, go the other way to avoid The Hill.

Bear spray? hmmmmm, never needed it or felt insecure without in that area. Maybe up by Skagway.

[chelle]

Sorry for the confusion. The bikes will be attached to the bike racks on my truck for the ride up the big hill. It's a 4 cylinder but I think it'll make it up the hill.

 

Chilko lake is on the itinerary, so is Turner lake. We're also planning to do an overnight trip up the McKenzie trail to some lakes and hang out a couple days. Before heading up the big hill we're planning to hike out to the Ape lake overlook and check out the views of the coast range glaciers. The mountain bikes are for some cool trails we read about near the east side of Tweedsmuir that open up onto the plateau; and they're insurance in case we have truck trouble and need to ride into a town for help.

 

Bill, thanks for the tip on the fishing pole. It'd be nice to actually eat a fish caught in a mountain lake. Haven't done that since I was a kid. And I'm glad to hear about the bears, it's a worry of mine. We'll have spray with us just in case.

[Dru]

Turner Lakes trail got burnt by a huge fire last year and may still be closed.

 

It is def. worth hiking in to the Rainbow Range for the colours of ther ground alone.

 

Bring rock gear for the crags near Bella Coola. It's like there's 5 Squamish Chiefs on either side of the valley.

[Bill_Simpkins]

Well, since you are going down to Chilko (very pretty),

there are many better lakes for fishing than Piper.

Just bring your pole and throw it in where ever. Rainbows in the lakes and sometimes you'll get a Dolly-Vardin in the creeks. Take some small spinners. Let me know if it's still good up there. In some lakes we caught our limit in less than an hour! Fish Lake used to be good, but I believe they put a mine up there. Have fun!

[fern]

Rainbow Range for sure. Don't miss that.

 

In Bella Coola it shouldn't be difficult to find someone to take you out on a boat to the rocks engraved by Alexnder McKenzie. I wish I could remember the name of the guy, but it was a long time ago.

 

Hiking to Ape Lake itself is probably a just day trip for fit people. You can drive the road up to Odegaard Falls and then hike around to the lake. It's an interesting lake that produces jokulhlaups

[Dru]

Ape Lake from Nusatsum Road i have been told is like a very long day each way or 2 shorter days

 

It took us 10 minutes by chopper though!

 

[fern]

day = 24hrs

[Don_Serl]

one of the easiest ways to "get high" in that neck of the woods is to drive the road to Miner Lake, then continue to the old minesite on the flanks of Perkins Peak. this takes you out into VERY extensive open alpland, dotted with beautiful little lakes. take the left fork about 2km before the minesite and the right branch 3 or 4km further along, and you can drive really high on the E slopes of Perkins [2842m], which is just a high, easy, half-day scree ramble - with superb views south into the Waddington Range, etc!

 

don't miss Chilko Lake - the views from the Nemaia valley make it the finest piece of scenery of any kind in British Columbia.

 

if you want to just ramble, take the logging roads west of Klinakleen up into the McClinchey Creek country, and follow your nose - there are spurs to near treeline, and the open country (dotted with literally hundreds of tarns) extends for dozens of km to the west to and beyond Wilderness Mtn.

 

the whole Chilcotin is ideal for "drifting" - i never tire of the place...

 

cheers,

[chelle]

Hey there. 6 days till takeoff. Does anyone know if we can actually use the Rainbow Cabin as a shelter rather than bring along a tent for our overnight?

 

Thanks.

[Dru]

Why don't you ask the Parks staff.

[chelle]

I will when we get there...but I thought some of you might have an answer.

[chelle]

We're back from our 10 day adventure in Bella Coola - Chilcotin area. It was a great time, but a little on the unusally rainy side. According to the locals the Chilcotin gets occasional thunder storms this time of year, but it had been raining nearly every day for the past 4 weeks. Climate change?

 

Thanks for all the advice on places to check out. We weren't able to get down to Ape Lake because the road is washed out 12k from the trailhead. Many of the Bella Coola valley 4WD roads had bad washouts this spring from all the rain. The place seems to be a little slice of heaven for anglers. The Chilcotin is amazing. I can't wait to get back there in better weather and do some more exploring.

 

Dru - were you joking when you said we should ask the parks staff? What parks staff? There was a pretty knowledgeable volunteer at the info office in Bella Coola, but he didn't have much info about the park, other than to tell us that a campground was closed due to bears when it was really only closed to tent campers... The place is pretty deserted of parks staff and the people we talked to on the return at BC Parks office in Williams Lake were lame. I guess they've poured all their resources into a pretty slick web site and figure so few people go there it is not really worth staffing.