Castleguard Meadows (Day 1)
The Castleguard Meadows via the Alexandra River Trail: without a doubt the most challenging hike, both physically and mentally, that we ever did so far. The Meadows are accessible via two routes: a 35-km old decommissioned fire road along the Alexandra River and Castleguard River or the more direct route over the Saskatchewan Glacier. We opted for the first option. Finding information on this trail proved to be hard. I was lucky enough to get a GPS track from MartyUpNorth when he attempted to reach the Meadows earlier this summer but he turned around at some point, having lost the trail. I had been thinking about doing this kind of “adventurous” hike for a while, and let me tell you, my wishes were fulfilled!
After an early morning flight to Calgary, we established our base camp for the night at the Tunnel Mountain Campground in Banff National Park. We prepared all our gear for the 5 days/4 nights trip with an extra day of food just in case. We picked up our bivouac permit at the Banff Visitor Centre. The lady at the counter wished us good luck after telling us that the Alexandra River Trail used to be the route the park’s warden would drive to relocate “problematic” bears further into the backcountry and was now mostly a “bear highway” from the meadows. She also told us a story about a famous bear who was once released at the end of the trail, and when the wardens made it back to the main road, the bear had floated down the river all the way back to the main road too!
Leaving the campground at 6:00AM, way before the end of the quiet hours period, we decided to stop later along the highway to pack our stuff and get breakfast while watching the sunrise. The air was cool and slightly smoky.
The first 6 kilometers of the trail were quite boring and uninspiring. We followed the obvious old fire road, through the forest. We quickly realized how brutal this trip would be while climbing over fallen trees one after the other. The trail was sprinkled with bear scat piles every 12 feet. I must’ve said “HEY BEAR!” a million times over the next 5 days. The trail was overgrown and narrow which made a bear encounter our main concern.
The trail eventually opened up and we were finally able to get nice views of both the turquoise colored Alexandra River and the surroundings peaks.
The river had washed out a few sections of the trail so instead of fording it (too fast and too deep), we followed the makeshift trail along the shore. It went up and down constantly and the wet ground made for slow and careful travel.
It then took us across small tributaries of the Alexandra River and they were easy (but cold) to walk through. The trail disappeared on the other side. There were so many paths from dried creek beds and game trails… it was confusing. But looking at the GPS, we knew the general direction of travel and picked up the obvious path once it went back into a treed section. We were getting tired but at least we managed to keep our shoes dry the entire day. With only one more major creek crossing left before our established campground for the night — the old Castleguard Warden’s Cabin — we kept a good pace until the end of the day.
We made it to the old cabin at KM 20.9 after a demanding 8-hour hike. Exhausted, we rushed to set the tent up and installed a tarp to cover our gear as the sky was getting darker by the minute. There was a lot of dead wood everywhere and starting a fire was both comforting and relaxing.
Castleguard Warden’s Cabin
We had diner around the campfire, reflecting on this ambitious day of backpacking. Perhaps stopping at the old campsite at KM 13.5 would’ve made this day easier? The deadfall along the trail is what slowed us down considerably. Little did we knew at the moment that this first day was nothing compared to what lay in front of us for Day 2…
We went to bed early just as the rain started pouring pretty badly. Needless to say, we both fell asleep in seconds!
