Dates hiked: July 12-15, 2025

Hikers: Katie & Ryan

Route Outline

Day 1: Trailhead to Lower Fryatt Camp

Approx. 11 km

We got to the trailhead later than planned (around 5 o'clock in the evening) as we spent the day travelling across BC. We had spent the previous night just east of Kamloops in the back of our car, and thus had a roughly 5-hour drive to Jasper; however, with the electric car we had to make a couple of charging stops which definitely increased our time on the road. Despite the longer overall drive time, we'd still say doing the trip in our EV was worth it – in total we spent only $20 on charging to get from Victoria to Jasper! Besides, during our first charge stop between Kamloops and Jasper we were able to totally organize and pack our backpacks for the trail, which we would have had to do at some point anyways.

The beginning of the trail is clearly an old abandoned road, quite wide and level. The first couple of km pass through blackened burn scar from the massive 2024 fire, which was quite eerie to walk through. The grasses and wildflowers are back in full force this season though, and birds and other small critters could be seen and heard throughout the woods as we walked.

The trail gently finds its way towards the Athabasca River and then runs parallel to it for quite a while, at one point getting right up to the riverbank - likely the spot where winter travelers would cross the frozen river to knock about 7-8km off their total distance into the hut.

Eventually, around km 7.5 the trail dives away from the river towards the Fryatt Valley. Remaining nearly flat until this point, the trail begins a gentle climb that ramps up in a few quick spurts.

There were a few rocky sections along the way, and some sections that narrowed to what we consider a "wide single track" trail, rather than the defined double track of the old road, but overall very rideable on a mountain bike - which Parks does allow up to the Lower Fryatt site. The only sections that would have been trickier on a bike were navigating a handful of awkward-height deadfalls across the trail.

We arrived at a mostly full campsite, with two tent pads remaining for us to choose from. After we made our choice, we promptly set to making dinner - a favourite store-bought meal of ours: Backpackers Pantry Pad Thai with Chicken. Two other couples were sitting around a small fire at the site – we were very surprised to see a Parks Canada-branded firepit, complete with chopped wood for campers to use – so we joined them and chatted for a little while before they turned in for the evening. We cleaned up from dinner, brushed our teeth and then headed to bed as well, since we planned a relatively early morning to hike the remaining 11ish km to the hut.

Day 2: Lower Fryatt to ACC Hut

Approx. 11 km

We set our alarm for 6am and were out of bed shortly thereafter. Ryan started packing up the tent, while I got up and got food and water organized for breakfast. We chatted with some of the other campers while we ate, and one couple said that they were heading up to Brussels campground for the night and then would be at the hut the following night. We looked forward to having their company in a couple days. The other hikers were all heading back to the trailhead. Once we were packed up, we set off for the hut!

For a number of kilometres, the trail winds its way through the forest at a relatively gentle but steady climb. The underbrush was thick in many places, crowding the trail, and due to the previous night's rain we got quite damp as we walked. We passed a solo hiker heading out who looked totally soaked. Eventually Ryan opted to put his rain pants on, but I didn’t bother since he was in the lead and brushing most of the water away for me :)

The sound of the rushing creek slowly faded away as we walked, and then eased back into earshot as we continued farther. The trail got very close to the creek side at one point, and we saw a short trail down to it so went and took a look: wow! What a stunning valley!

We hopped back onto the main trail to find ourselves quickly at a log bridge crossing the wide and rushing creek. Once on the other side the trail simply follows the rocky creekside; a few different routes could be seen, winding and weaving their way along to avoid or cross over various stretches of water. After about 2km of rocky walking, we arrived at Brussels Campground, the second and final campground along the trail before the hut. We stopped for a quick bathroom break but were eager to get going again as the bugs were pretty bad.

We carried on along the valley floor, the peaks on either side of the valley really towering over us now. We could see waterfalls on both sides rushing the meltwater down into the creek. Then seemingly out of nowhere, a huge cairn was in front of us, and just beyond that a stunning bright blue lake.

We packed down at the cairn and ventured off to get close to a waterfall on the west side of the valley. The breeze at this higher point was doing wonders to keep the bugs away, so we opted to have lunch right at the cairn.

Bellies full, we followed much smaller cairns to descend to the lakeshore. After only a few steps it started to rain, so we paused to put our jackets and pack covers on. Once we were at the level of the lake, we followed the trail along its western side, getting peekaboo views of peaks to the east through gaps in the trees as we went.

About 3 km past Brussels, just before starting the climb up the dreaded valley headwall, is the old Headwall Campground. This camping area was closed by Parks a few years ago due to rockfall risk; a picnic table and the old bear hang still remain. We stopped briefly to chat with a couple that was stopped for a snack there. They had stayed at the hut the night before, and for their way out had attempted to climb over a shoulder of Mt Fryatt to exit the area via the Geraldine Lakes Trail, but they couldn’t find a safe route – finding themselves “cliffed out” they opted to backtrack to the hut and follow the Fryatt Valley trail back out. We wished them luck with the long, late day they had ahead of them and steeled ourselves for the final push of our day: the headwall.

The headwall climb brings hikers up about 200m of elevation in the short distance of 500m laterally, giving an average slope angle just less than 45*. We drew similarities between it and the “dirt chute” that we hiked as part of our Golden Hinde trek back in 2020. In the Parks Canada guide to the Fryatt area, it’s very clearly stated to ensure that you follow the yellow trail markers for this section, because if you veer off the proper route, it can be very difficult and dangerous to get back to it. While tough, the climb was thankfully over quickly, and the sharp elevation gain gave us stunning views over the lake and valley below. We always have fun setting up a hiking pole tripod to take photos together!

A final 400m of hiking brought us past an ice-blue pool of water with a rushing inflow but no visible outflow – so interesting – and then finally to an even lovelier sight: the hut!

We took some time after unpacking and getting our sleeping area set up to read through entries in the Hut Register book. Many entries mentioned hikers’ surprise at how not busy this hut is. A few tales recounted the absolute slog of getting up to the hut in the winter – from what we read, it sounds like the average ski/hike time is about 16 hours one way. A recurrent character throughout the years was Kevin the Porcupine (though he never made an appearance for us). There were many detailed drawings, including artistic maps of the area, in the register, and as the trip went on we started to refer to places by the names we'd read - such as Serenity Pool, pictured here:

While we were relaxing, the other two hut occupants – a father and son from Grand Prairie – arrived donned in their raingear after a day exploring the upper valley area. The four of us chatted and made our dinners; for us it was a home-dehydrated Sweet Potato Chickpea Stew that was wonderfully delicious. We learned that the dad's other son (who couldn't join them for this trip) had been the one to first build the massive cairn we saw, years ago on their family's first trip up here!

After dinner, we each played our own card games until we offered to teach the other folks Euchre so we could have a game all together. Once our game was done, we all retreated to our beds. It had been a couple of very long days for us so we were happy for the early sleep!

Day 3: Exploring around Fryatt Valley Hut

Approx 8.5 km

On our first morning in the hut, we were gently awoken by the sounds of our two hut-mates quietly packing up to head back to their car. In the background, all we could hear was rain on the hut’s tin roof… so we chose to keep sleeping, eventually waking up naturally around 10:30am. After the previous few long days, the sleep-in was much needed, plus we figured there wasn’t much point in getting out of bed just to sit around in the hut or venture out in the pouring rain. When planning this trip, we’d thought that we would attempt a summit of one of the smaller mountains accessed from the Fryatt Valley, but with the rain, low clouds, and intermittent fog, we decided that it would be smarter to explore below the clouds today.

We had a nice slow morning, and after our oatmeal breakfast we got ready to go explore despite the rain. We donned our rain gear, top and bottoms, and were ready to go!

We hiked along a cut trail from the hut to the southwest, which followed the creek up the valley. The first interesting feature that we came across was a large cave that the creek rushes into, about 550m from the hut.

After checking out the cave as much as we reasonably could, we followed the trail upstream where we saw that it was gently flowing out of another cave. From there, the trail ventured through a boulder field until we came upon the shoreline of a beautiful turquoise lake.

We followed the marshy lakeside to our left, finding our own route as the trail disappeared in the softer ground. Once we were about halfway around the lake, we consulted the topo map on our Gaia GPS app to decide our next move. The other guys at the hut had talked about getting to the bottom of the glacier that was at the end of the valley, but from where we were standing we weren’t exactly sure where it would be as it wasn’t visible at all from the relatively low elevation of the lake. We decided that rather than pushing for that glacier, we’d try to get to another one that we’d seen from the hut, on the left/east side of the valley.

We picked our way up a rocky slope, navigating large and small rocks that were covered in extremely slippery lichen. As we climbed, the glacier we'd spotted from the hut eventually came into view. Sadly we also saw that we wouldn’t safely be able to get right up to it due to the terrain... So we got as close as we felt comfortable with, and then turned around to find ourselves dazzled by the otherworldly blue of the lake below. It was also around this time that we noticed the rain had stopped – yay!

We did a time check and figured we might as well try to find the glacier that the other guys had talked about, so we descended a bit and then traversed across the scree and talus slope to the southwest, towards the glacier that we couldn’t see.

As we gained a new perspective from the different angle as we hiked, a large tarn came into view. Reading the terrain at that point, we deduced that if there was a route up to this glacier, it must follow the spur of higher ground from that tarn and climb to the south/southwest. We were right – eventually we found the route, marked by rock cairns. We followed the cairns until we could see the toe of the glacier and the shallow-looking lake that its meltwater was draining into.

Unfortunately, at that point we were approaching the turnaround time that we had set for ourselves (5:30pm), so we made the call to head back down to the hut.

But we still hadn’t touched a glacier… “Wait!” we thought – there was another smaller glacier not too far to the east that we should be able to reasonably get to without taking too much time. Instead of descending right away, we traversed across boulder fields to reach it – and walk on it.

Feeling a sense of accomplishment, we boot-skied down the lower snowfield and then made our way back to the cairned route above the lake. As we approached the steeper section above the lake, the cairns disappeared and we forged our own route down for a while until I suddenly noticed a small hole in the dirt that had obviously been created by a hiking pole. The trail was still quite faint and hard to follow for a bit through larger rocks, until it cut down a grassier slope. When we reached the marshy lakeshore, we took a moment to look back up the trail we’d just come down, noticing a cairn that marked the beginning of it, and creating a waypoint in our GPS app in case we come back to the area.

From the lake, we followed the same trail back to the hut that we’d taken earlier in the day, except for a small detour that we explored to find the outflow of the creek downhill from the cave. By the time we got back to the hut, the clouds had nearly completely cleared and the sun was shining brightly.

For dinner we ate our second homemade meal – a Cashew Curry Couscous with black fungus mushrooms. It was pretty good, but we’re planning to add some more curry powder and use a little less salt next time we make it.

We played a game of crib and then went to bed, knowing we had a long hike out ahead of us the next day.

Day 4: Fryatt Hut back to Trailhead

Approx. 22 km

We woke up early to a perfectly clear sky, the sound of the rushing creek and birds chirping nearby. We ate our oatmeal, packed up our gear – wait a minute… where the heck did Ryan’s camp sandals go?? Did the other group accidentally take them yesterday? We searched everywhere to no avail, so we washed the dishes and countertops, swept the floor, and pushed off.

Going down the headwall was much easier and faster than the climb two days prior; we were thankful that the rain had stopped, because the steep descent would have been treacherous in the wet. We felt bad for the father and son who had hiked out in the downpour the day before.

In what felt like no time at all, we reached the old headwall campground, then continued to make quick work of retracing our steps past the lower blue lake towards the wide and rocky river valley. The hike all the way to the bridge crossing the creek flew by, and then we were enveloped by the lush green forest once more. We continued our brisk pace, the lure of the Miette Hot Springs calling to us as we descended, and we arrived back at the Lower Fryatt Campground around 11:30am.

We enjoyed a slow lunch, taking the time to air out our feet as we sat at a picnic table to eat our tuna and flatbread. We got back on the trail just before noon. While the remainder of the hike out was very easygoing, cruisy, and mostly flat (except for those pesky deadfall trees across the trail), the last few kilometres to the car seemed to really drag on.

Finally, a glint through the trees! Just around one more bend, there was the trailhead and parking lot. And...! What was that on the big flat boulder there?! Huzzah: Ryan’s sandals :)