Blue Face in Parkhurst Ghost Town, Whistler

Garibaldi Park Whistler A to ZBack in 2011 Kups, a Whistler local and now professional muralist painted a hauntingly surreal, blue face on the side of this house.  This beautiful mural, along with the fact that this is the last fully intact house in Parkhurst makes it the most well known and photographed structure in the old ghost town.  It is difficult to figure out why the Blue Face house outlasted all the others, but it appears to still be quite structurally sound.

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Cletrac in Parkhurst Ghost Town, Whistler

Garibaldi Park Whistler A to Z: NunatukAdjacent to the huge Caterpillar tractor in Parkhurst is a large disintegrating wooden dock that is a great place to take in the wonderful view of Green Lake.  From the dock if you look to the right you will see a large triangle of deep forest jutting out into the lake.  This is where the Parkhurst Sawmill once operated for thirty years.  Looking at the almost impenetrable forest now, it is hard to picture this area without trees and with train tracks extending into a large building housing the sawmill with an enormous steel chimney several dozen metres tall. 

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Green Lake - Hike in Whistler Glossary

Garibaldi Park Whistler A to Z: Green LakeGreen Lake is the marvellously vivid, green coloured lake just north of Whistler Village.  Driving north on the Sea to Sky Highway, Green Lake appears along the highway on your right.  The vivid colour is always impressive and on a sunny day can be spectacular.  One of the best, and easiest places in Whistler to capture an extraordinary sunrise or sunset photo is along the Green Lake viewpoint along the edge of the highway.

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Parkhurst Ghost Town Hike Whistler

Parkhurst Ghost Town Hike RatingWhistler has an absurd number of wonderful and free hiking trails and Parkhurst Ghost Town certainly ranks as the most unusual and interesting. Parkhurst was a little logging town perched on the edge of Green Lake from the 1920's to 50's, way before Whistler was Whistler. Up on the ridge where Parkhurst sits, the views are sensational. Green Lake far below, glows green in a way that doesn't quite look real and has to be seen to be believed.

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Parkhurst Ghost Town Snowshoeing Whistler

Parkhurst Snowshoe RatingAt the north end of Green Lake hides one of the most unusual, interesting and scenic snowshoe trails in Whistler, Parkhurst Ghost Town.  From the 1920’s to 1950’s a small logging town with several dozen houses and a sawmill, the town quickly vacated in 1956 when the sawmill ceased operating.  Decades of snowy winter crushed the old sawmill and all but two of the old houses.  Various types of logging machinery, old vehicles, trucks, Caterpillar tractors and a Cletrac tractor lay in the forest unmoved for almost seventy years. 

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Parkhurst Ridge in Parkhurst Ghost Town, Whistler

Garibaldi Park Whistler A to Z: NunatukParkhurst Ridge is an incredible place for a lot of reasons.  Of course, the view is spectacular with Green Lake's absurdly vivid green coloured water.  Snowy mountains all around.  Wonderfully varied clifftop terrain with easily accessible cliff plateaus leading like giant steps down to the water.  The forest on the ridge is sparse enough to be always sunny, but with plenty of trees to make it feel secluded.

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Sawmill Site in Parkhurst Ghost Town, Whistler

Garibaldi Park Whistler A to Z: NunatukThe sawmill at Parkhurst operated on the triangle of land that juts out into Green Lake and also extended north between the train tracks and the lake.  The old sawmill was almost certainly crushed under heavy snow in the years following its closure in 1956.  With the town abandoned there were no caretakers to maintain any of the old structures and the crushing weight of spring snow eventually flattened all but two of the old houses and the sawmill buildings.

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Wye in Parkhurst Ghost Town, Whistler

Garibaldi Park Whistler A to Z: NunatukWhen hiking to Parkhurst Ghost Town, the first area you will encounter after you cross the disintegrating bridge over Wedge Creek is the wye.  In railroad terminology a wye is a large turnaround area which traces a large triangle shape and allows trains to exit the main train tracks and turnaround.  The original wye in the area was Mons Wye located about where the Catholic church at the end of Lorimer Road is today.

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Whistler Hiking Trails

The Rainbow Trail is a convenient and popular trail near Whistler Village that takes you to Rainbow Lake as well as the Rainbow-Sproatt Flank Trail, Rainbow Falls, Hanging Lake, Madeley Lake, Beverley ...
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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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Cheakamus Lake is a wonderfully relaxing way to get in the wilderness easily and quickly from Whistler Village. The trail begins on the far side of Whistler Mountain, 8 kilometres from the Sea to Sky Highway ...
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Cheakamus River is a beautiful, crashing, turquoise coloured river that flows from Cheakamus Lake, through Whistler Interpretive Forest, then down past Brandywine Falls to Daisy Lake, then all the way to ...
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Vancouver Hiking Trails

Unnecessary Mountain gets its peculiar name from the fact it once was part of the route to reach The Lions whereas now the route avoids it.  This now, ...
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Mount Harvey is one of the huge, visible and hikeable summits in the North Shore mountains. It is located on the Howe Sound Crest Trail in Cypress ...
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Lighthouse Park is an extraordinarily little know piece of paradise, so close to to Vancouver as to see its tall buildings, yet immersed into a ...
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Dog Mountain is a beautiful, short and fun hike (or snowshoe trek) close to Vancouver and starting from the parking lot of Mount Seymour Resort.  Just 2.2 ...
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Whistler Snowshoe Trails

Brandywine Falls Provincial Park is a beautiful park centred around the wonderful falls that plunge 70 metres down a vertical wall of glacier fractured rock.  The peculiar, angular cubes of rock that the cliffs ...
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Rainbow Park is one of the hugely popular swimming beaches in Whistler in the summer.  In the winter it is a spectacular vantage point across Alta Lake to Whistler Mountain and Blackcomb Mountain.  The ...
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Hiking and biking trails are so abundant in Whistler that many go unnoticed, neglected or taken for granted.  The Flank Trail is one of these.  Most people in Whistler don't even know about it, but the ones that ...
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Wedgemount Lake is a steep and difficult hike in the summer when there is no snow.  It doesn't require technical skill, but it is just exhausting.  You gain 1220 metres of elevation in just 7 kilometres(+2 in ...
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Hike in Whistler Glossary

Erratic or glacier erratic is a piece of rock that has been carried by glacial ice, often hundreds of kilometres.  Characteristic of their massive size and ...
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The Fitzsimmons Range is a subsection of the Garibaldi Ranges that covers the area between the valleys of Cheakamus Lake and Fitzsimmons Creek.  Fitzsimmons ...
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Back in 2011 Kups, a Whistler local and now professional muralist painted a hauntingly surreal, blue face on the side of this house.  This beautiful ...
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The second Caterpillar tractor in Parkhurst Ghost Town is considerably harder to find despite being just a few metres from the hulking Caterpillar at the shore ...
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The Garibaldi Volcanic Belt is a line of mostly dormant stratovolcanoes and subglacial volcanoes largely centred around Whistler and extending through much ...
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When hiking to Parkhurst Ghost Town, the first area you will encounter after you cross the disintegrating bridge over Wedge Creek is the wye.  In railroad ...
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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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Fitzsimmons Creek is the beautiful and huge creek that crashes through Whistler Village.  When walking from Whistler Village to the Upper Village, you will cross ...
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Best Hiking by Month

September hiking in Whistler is possibly the best month of all.  The snow has melted far up to the mountain tops, yet the temperatures are still quite high.  ...
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Hiking in Whistler in October is often unexpectedly stunning.  The days are much shorter and colder but the mountains are alive with colour from the fall ...
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November in Whistler is when the temperatures plummet and the first heavy snow falls in the alpine and often in Whistler Village.  The hiking opportunities become ...
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December hiking in Whistler is mainly done on snowshoes, though not always. If it hasn't snowed much recently then trails such as Whistler Train Wreck and ...
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Best of Whistler

Whistler is very dog friendly and the number of wonderful hiking trails that your dog will love is huge. The massively varied hiking trails range from easy, short, ...
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There are plenty of excellent, kid and family friendly hiking trails and destinations in and around Whistler. Kid and family friendly generally means an easy and ...
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Whistler is surrounded by an immense wilderness dotted with spectacular, hidden lakes and amazing places to set up a tent.  Decades of logging activity has left a ...
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Whistler as a resort has a wonderful car-free core. The Village Stroll runs through the heart of Whistler Village and is entirely car free. If you are visiting Whistler or ...
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Hike in Whistler News & Blog

September 5th, 2022: Madeley Lake is a stunning wilderness lake high up in the Callaghan Valley that is easily accessible by a decades old logging road.  ...
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February 1st, 2023: The beautiful murals that make Whistler Train Wreck the magical place it is today began appearing in 2011 when this hidden place was ...
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November 18th, 2022: Way up in the Callaghan Valley on the back side of Mount Sproatt is an abandoned gold mine.  Old cement foundations and two ...
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January 2nd, 2023: The Rubble Creek trailhead to Garibaldi Provincial Park is consistently snowplowed this season.  The two kilometre access road is still ...
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Best Whistler Waterfalls

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 ...
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Brandywine Falls is one of the must see sights on the way to or from Whistler. The falls drop from a 70 metre(230 feet), unnaturally abrupt looking cliff ...
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Wedgemount Falls can be seen along the trail to Wedgemount Lake.  As the falls flow directly from Wedgemount Lake, they are located about three quarters ...
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Holloway Falls is the beautiful waterfalls you see partway along the Joffre Lakes Provincial Park trail.  Located between Middle Joffre Lake and Upper ...
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Explore BC Hiking Destinations!

Whistler Hiking Trails

Hiking in Whistler is spectacular and wonderfully varied. Looking at a map of Whistler you see an extraordinary spider web of hiking trails that are unbelievably numerous. Easy trails, moderate trails and challenging hiking trails are all available. Another marvellous ...
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Squamish Hiking Trails

Squamish is located in the midst of a staggering array of amazing hiking trails. Garibaldi Provincial Park sprawls alongside Squamish and up and beyond Whistler. Tantalus Provincial Park lays across the valley to the west and the wonderfully remote Callaghan Valley ...
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Vancouver Hiking Trails

Vancouver is surrounded by seemingly endless hiking trails and mountains to explore.  Massive parks line up one after another.  Mount Seymour Provincial Park, Lynn Canyon Park, Grouse Mountain, Cypress Park and the enormous Garibaldi Park all contribute to Vancouver ...
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Clayoquot Hiking Trails

Clayoquot Sound has a staggering array of hiking trails within it.  Between Tofino and Ucluelet, Pacific Rim Park has several wilderness and beach trails, each one radically different from the last.  The islands in the area are often Provincial parks on their own with ...
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Victoria Hiking Trails

Victoria has a seemingly endless number of amazing hiking trails.  Most take you to wild and beautiful Pacific Ocean views and others take you to tranquil lakes in beautiful BC Coastal Rainforest wilderness.  Regional Parks and Provincial Parks are everywhere you turn in ...
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The West Coast Trail

The West Coast Trail was created after decades of brutal and costly shipwrecks occurred along the West Coast of Vancouver Island.  One shipwreck in particular was so horrific, tragic and unbelievable that it forced the creation of a trail along the coast, which ...
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