Rainbow Mountain & Rainbow Lake Hike, Whistler, BC, Canada
Rainbow Mountain hike is a 28 Km (As measured on Strava) out-and-back trail near Whistler, British Columbia. Generally considered a challenging route, it took u around 11 hours to complete the hike. This is a popular trail for birding, camping, and hiking, but you can still enjoy some solitude during quieter times of day. You'll need to leave pups at home — dogs aren't allowed on this trail. Here are the chapters of the Rainbow Mountain and Lake Hike trail:
00:00 Hiking preview
00:47 Trailhead
The trail starts right from the parking lot. There are a lot of other trails in the area so it's important to carry GPS guide. We carried AllTrails map for the navigation purposes. Initially, the trail is easy. The first 1.5 Km is little steep but still comparatively moderate as you gain 900 meters of elevation in the first 7.5Km until the Rainbow lake. There is a washroom at the trailhead and the trail is wide at the beginning. This entire trail has a lot of washroom facility as well as natural sources of water coming from the glaciers up in the mountains in form of creeks. Please also note that this area works as watershed for Whistler as the town of Whistler gets water from the Rainbow lake and other creeks nearby. That's camping, swimming or cooking around these water resources have been prohibited. We were hiking this trail in the end of July so there were no snow on the trail except of the last part near the peak.
02:08 Rainbow Hiking trail
From around 1.8 Kms from the parking lot, you will come across this another trailhead called Rainbow hiking trail as mentioned on the board there. The trail gets narrower from here until the peak. The trail is mostly covered under the canopy in the old-growth forest. Please note that this area is famous for bears such as black bears and grizzly bears so it's recommended to hike in the group and keep making noises.
03:34 Washroom & first big bridge
At around 4.3Km from the parking lot, you will come across this newly constructed bridge along with the fly house there as washroom. That's a nice spot to take a break and some picture.
03:47 Waterfall
Almost 100 meters from the previous bridge, you will come across a magnificent waterfall. Post this spot, the trail opens up even more and you also sometimes start to get the view of the surrounding mountains and wildflowers as the trail slowly starts to pass through the meadow.
04:29 Second big bridge
You will come across another big bridge at 6.1 Km mark from the parking lot. Please make sure to carry the Alltrails app as it's very easy to take the winter or summer route here depending on when you are going on Rainbow mountain hike. From this point, the trail becomes almost flat till the Rainbow Lake through the meadow.
05:10 Rainbow Lake
Once you arrive at the Rainbow Lake, You can actually see different colors of the Rainbow Lake on a bright and sunny day, maybe that's why it was named Rainbow Lake. You will also see a board there with nearby trails information but I could not locate information about the rainbow mountain trail. We continued along the trail for almost another 1KM or little more before we turned right for the Rainbow Mountain. The trail is flat here.
05:52 Keep right for Rainbow Mountain
Keep right after the Rainbow Lake for rainbow mountain. Follow the creek there. The trail is marked for some distance and then the marking is no more there. You can also now see the Rainbow Mountain in the background.
06:22 No more trail signs | Follow Stone cairns
After some time, you won't see any trail sign. Please make sure to carry the trail map for ease of access and navigation. For instance, we went offtrail for almost one hour before coming back on the trail as shown in AllTrails. The trail becomes rocky with a lot of loose boulders. Some hikers have put stone cairns or stone heaps as a marker. If you can see one, please keep following them. Near the peak, you can see more such markers.
If you are lost, make sure to get back to the trail as the trail is the most optimal path to the Rainbow Mountain that's what we realized while returning down.
07:58 Snowfield near Peak
Just below the Rainbow Mountain peak, you will come across the Snowfield. From here, the trail is steep, full of loose rocks and boulders until the peak but you also start to get the view of the surrounding peaks and glaciers. There is a little bit of scrambling near the peak but nothing major. You keep getting the 360-degree view all along now. Be careful at the top as it might be windy. The actual peak is beyond this ridge and someone said that class 4 scrambling is actually required there. We did not go until that peak but the view from here itself was worth it.
#hiking #britishcolumbia #whistlerbc #rainbowmountain #vancouver #trekking
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