Spring Hiking Has Arrived!
Spring is here and summer is not far off! The road to Parkhurst Ghost Town is accessible now! Whistler Train Wreck is free of snow too. Check out Hike in Whistler May 2022 for inspiration!
Callaghan Lake is a stunning lake high up in the Callaghan Valley that you can drive to from Whistler Village in less than an hour. The very potholed and waterbar strewn gravel road to get there ends at the Callaghan Lake Provincial Park campsite and shore of the lake. Hardly any hiking trails exist at the lake itself, however trails are being planned for the near future. There is an amazing trail that starts at the far end of the lake to Cirque Lake as well as a trail from the Callaghan Lake campsite to Ring Lake.
Whistler & Garibaldi Hiking
Alexander Falls 
Ancient Cedars 
Black Tusk 
Blackcomb Mountain Brandywine Falls Brandywine Meadows Brew Lake Callaghan Lake Cheakamus Lake 
Cheakamus River 
Cirque Lake Flank Trail Garibaldi Lake Garibaldi Park Helm Creek Jane Lakes Joffre Lakes Keyhole Hot Springs Logger’s Lake Madeley Lake Meager Hot Springs Nairn Falls Newt Lake Panorama Ridge Parkhurst Ghost Town Rainbow Falls Rainbow Lake Ring Lake Russet Lake Sea to Sky Trail Skookumchuck Hot Springs Sloquet Hot Springs 
Sproatt East Sproatt West Taylor Meadows Train Wreck 
Wedgemount Lake Whistler Mountain
Whistler Aerial Views
Alexander Brandywine Blackcomb Callaghan Cirque Joffre Keyhole Logger's Madeley Panorama Sproatt Parkhurst Rainbow Russet Train Wreck Wedge Glacier Wedgemount Whistler
The Ring Lake trail takes you around Mount Callaghan to this beautiful mountain paradise while the Cirque Lake trail takes you far up alongside Mount Callaghan. Most visitors to Callaghan Lake Provincial Park camp or stay close to the main campsite area and paddle around the lake. The lake is surrounded by pristine wilderness and endless white capped mountains. There are dozens of interesting places along the shore to pull up your canoe and explore the wilderness or just find a sunny hilltop for a picnic. The right side of the lake is always sun facing and several rocky lakeside cliffs give you stunning views as well as a secluded oasis from the world. Almost anywhere you enter the forest along the shore of Callaghan Lake you will find the forest wide open under the thick forest canopy. Hiking through the forest is easy and quite beautiful. Little ground level foliage and only fallen trees to scramble over as you explore a marvellously untouched mountain rainforest. From the water, the shoreline looks thick with foliage and uninviting, but just metres in and you discover a beautiful hidden world. Halfway along the right hand side of Callaghan Lake you will see some cliffs along the shore. There you will find a quick route up to the top of the cliffs and a great place to view this amazing lake.
More Great Hiking Around Callaghan Lake
The Callaghan Valley lays quietly across from Whistler despite being home to some incredible hikes. Ring & Conflict Lake and Cirque Lake are two phenomenal hiking destinations in the valley that few people have even heard of. Cirque Lake resides high above Callaghan Lake at the end of a very steep, though very short hike that runs startlingly close to the almost vertical falls that empty Cirque Lake. Ring & Conflict Lake sit high up in the mountains 10 kilometres west of Callaghan Lake. You will never, or at least comparatively rarely see anyone on the trails to Cirque Lake, Ring & Conflict Lake for several reasons. First is location. Despite the Callaghan Valley being tremendously beautiful geographically. The distant mountains are snow covered, even in September. The lakes are emerald coloured and crystal clear. The forests are an untouched blanket of beautiful green. The creeks, rivers and waterfalls are everywhere in your view or if not in view, heard as distant sounds of running water. Despite this beauty, it seems that the biggest reason for the Callaghan Valley's lack of use as a hiking destination is its location next to Garibaldi Park. The beautiful and well known park focuses all the throngs of hikers in the justifiably popular areas of Garibaldi Lake, Black Tusk, Taylor Meadows, Wedgemount Lake and Elfin Lakes. Laying outside this monstrously famous Provincial Park exists the relatively untouched and unknown Callaghan Valley. The second big reason of course is that the hikes in the Callaghan Valley are unmaintained or at least rarely maintained. The campsite at Callaghan Lake is maintained to a very high standard, however the trail to Cirque Lake evidently doesn't fall into any park jurisdiction and finding the unmarked trailhead is a challenge. There are flagging tapes along the trail after the trailhead. The third reason, at least for Cirque Lake, for being hardly hiked is the fact that the unmarked trailhead starts at the far end of Callaghan Lake. So you need to canoe or otherwise, boat there. This added impediment surely contributes to this wonderful trail, continuing to be infrequently hiked. The fourth, more practical, yet inexplicable reason is that the road to Callaghan Lake Provincial Park is horribly unmaintained. Obviously grading this poor logging road is expensive, however it is beyond neglected. Boulders, waterbars and potholes exist on this road to such a high degree that the neglect seems malicious. In fact, the moment you leave the deluxe road to the Olympic Nordic Centre the monstrous potholes begin, presumably scaring away any 4x4 lacking tourists Callaghan Lake Provincial Park bound. The Callaghan Valley gets a lot of drive in traffic since the recent paving of the road and installation of Whistler Olympic Park for the 2010 Olympics. This road is open year-round and in the summer is frequented by bear watchers. The grass along the road is a favourite for bears and in the summer months consistently ensures at least a couple bears along the route to the Callaghan Valley. Whistler has quite a few beautiful waterfalls to see. From Squamish there is Shannon Falls, then Brandywine Falls closer to Whistler. Rainbow Falls in Whistler and Nairn Falls twenty minutes north. Out of these, Alexander Falls in the Callaghan Valley is both impressively huge and convenient to see. It is located just before the turnoff to Callaghan Lake. You can drive to the viewing platform and actually see the falls without leaving your car.
More Info for Callaghan Lake Provincial Park
The pale green shub-like growths hanging from trees in the forests around Whistler is called usnea. These bushy, coral-like fruticose lichens anchor to bark ...
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Wedge Creek cuts through the valley that separates Wedge Mountain and Blackcomb Mountain and empties into Green River near the north end of Green Lake. ...
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Aiguille: a tall, narrow, characteristically distinct spire of rock. From the French word for "needle". Used extensively as part of the names for many ...
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The Cloudraker Skybridge and the Raven’s Eye Cliff Walk are new additions to the summit of Whistler Mountain. The Cloudraker Skybridge stretches 130 ...
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The Barrier formed as a result of huge lava flows from Clinker Peak on the west shoulder of Mount Price during the last ice age. About thirteen thousand ...
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Ablation Zone: the lower altitude region of a glacier where there is a net loss of ice mass due to melting, sublimation, evaporation, ice calving or ...
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Cirque: a glacier-carved bowl or amphitheater in the mountains. To form, the glacier must be a combination of size, a certain slope and more unexpectedly, a ...
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The Peak 2 Peak Gondola connects Whistler Mountain and Blackcomb Mountain at a dizzying height of 436 metres(1427 feet). It runs all winter and in the ...
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Whistler & Garibaldi Hiking
Alexander Falls Ancient Cedars Black Tusk Blackcomb Mountain Brandywine Falls Brandywine Meadows Brew Lake Callaghan Lake Cheakamus Lake Cheakamus River Cirque Lake Flank Trail Garibaldi Lake Garibaldi Park Helm Creek Jane Lakes Joffre Lakes Keyhole Hot Springs Logger’s Lake Madeley Lake Meager Hot Springs Nairn Falls Newt Lake Panorama Ridge Parkhurst Ghost Town Rainbow Falls Rainbow Lake Ring Lake Russet Lake Sea to Sky Trail Skookumchuck Hot Springs Sloquet Hot Springs Sproatt East Sproatt West Taylor Meadows Train Wreck Wedgemount Lake Whistler Mountain
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The Sproatt East trail is a beautifully wild, steep, but relatively short trail to the magnificent, wide open alpine and summit of Mount Sproatt. Mount Sproatt (1834 metres) towers over Whistler Valley ...
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Nairn Falls is a wonderful, crashing and chaotic waterfall that surrounds you from the deluxe viewing platform that allows you to safely watch it from above. The beautiful, green water rushes through the ...
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Brew Lake is beautiful mountain lake just a short drive south of Whistler and is relatively unknown and seldom hiked. Laying at the base of Mount Brew, Brew Lake lays in a massive alpine valley of enormous ...
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Black Tusk is the extraordinarily iconic and appropriately named mountain that can be seen from almost everywhere in Whistler. The massive black spire of crumbling rock juts out of the earth in an incredibly ...
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