trip video

trip report

Maligne Lake to Curator Campgrounds

The start our trip, we drove to the Signal Trailhead to leave our car. The parking lot at Signal Trailhead was packed and we barely squeezed our car into a space at the end of the lot. This may be a good reason to head southbound and leave your car at the large Maligne Lake parking lot. However, that one gets pretty busy as well.

We started trying to hitchhiking just before 9 am so we found several other groups also doing the Skyline here waiting for the Maligne Adventures shuttle. We didn’t have to wait much longer than them as we were picked up about 15 minutes more minutes of waiting. Thanks to the couple from Edmonton!

trail information

It was 10 am when we got on our way from the Maligne Lake trailhead.

For the initial 3.5 miles to Evelyn Creek and Evelyn Campgrounds, the trail is through the forest with a slight uphill. The first point of interest was Lorraine Lake at 1.3 mile mark and Mona Lake at 1.8 mile mark.

The only other thing to note was how muddy the trail was in this early section. Slogging through the mud, we reached Evelyn Creek Trail junction, a crossing of Evelyn Creek, and the equally muddy Evelyn Creek Campgrounds. This was the only portion of trail we encountered on our trip that we’d wished we had our gaiters.

After the campgrounds, the uphills section started switchbacking at a 10.1 grade over the next 1.5 miles to the Little Shovel Campground. It was through the forest without much views. As we gained elevation, the trail started to become less muddy. However, we did notice some worn path at places where the switchbacks were cut. This is a reminder to not cut switchbacks as they lead to greater erosion of the trail.

After a brief bathroom break, we continued uphills for another 0.8 miles. The grade started flatten out a little bit with an average of 7.0% as we neared the treeline. Trowel Peak can be seen in front of us.

After the treeline, the trail curves to our right along the side of the mountain and flattening out as we came to meadow bench, which we traversed in two thirds of a mile.

Our first pass of the hike was Little Shovel pass at 6.7 miles from the trailhead. The pass was rather flat and wasn’t too interesting.

On the otherside of the pass, the trail drops at a -16.8% grade over 0.4 miles with a view of the end of the next basin we were heading into

and outward down the drainage.

At the bottom of our descent, we came to a stream followed by two third mile of relatively flat trail until Snowbowl Campground. We did need to hop a few rocks to cross the stream.

The flat trail continued for another 1.5 miles as we curved around the mountain side before continuing through a grassy flat with plenty of wildflowers. This was the perfect section for getting lost in your own mind among the idyllic field.

There are a few streams there with bridges through this section and at the second stream crossing, the trail start to head up hill with an initial 0.4 mile at roughly 7.5% grade. Then the trail flattened out again briefly through a marshy and muddy section as we followed and then crossed another stream.

The next uphill was at roughly a 10.3% grade over 1.2 miles toward our Big Shovel Pass sitting under Curator Mountain.

We reached the barren Big Shovel Pass 11.3 miles from the trailhead. We didn’t stick around for long as the view was pretty monotonous and the stiff wind made us cold. The trail continued to curve around the mountain to our right.

As we continued on from the pass, we were able to get a better look down the drainage under Curator Mountain where we would be heading for Curator Campgrounds. To the right of drainage was Curator Lake on another bench and the Notch pass we would go over the next day.

After a slight uphill and then downhill over a half mile from Big Shovel Pass, we reached the junction for the Watchtower Trail. We decided to drop our packs and head up to the pass for a look down the Watchtower drainage. It was only a 0.15 mile one way detour, but the grade was 21.8% with switchbacks.

Returning to the Skyline, we continued for another mile at a slight downhill to reach the junction for the Curator Campgrounds side trail. From here, we could see the campgrounds amongst the trees below in the valley.

While it was only 0.6 miles down to the campgrounds, we were going to lose good amount of elevation with a -14.2% grade with plenty of switchbacks. After crossing a final stream, we arrived at our home for the night.

We chose campsite number 8 since it was the farthest area from the pit toilet cooking area. The little stream next to it was also nice.

After setting up camp and cooking dinner, we ended up turning in early since it was the coldest evenings in the mountains we had encountered so far on the trip.

The rating below are based on an unevenly distributed scale of 1 (lowest) to 5 (highest). For full description of the ratings and the categories, see the explanation here.

views/experience: 3. Unfortunately for us, we hiked the best part of the trail in complete cloud cover, save for a glimpse at the end. The view was of the Athabasca River Valley that the Icefield Parkway travels through and Mount Edith Cavell sits behind on the opposite side. The rating of 3 is really predicated on what could have been here even though I thought about rating this hike as a 2 based on our experience.

Otherwise, I enjoyed the rigid looking Mount Tekkera, ledge walk with views out toward the Maligne River drainage continuing into the Athabasca River Valley to the north,

and the high alpine meadows. The views from the Notch and Big Shovel Pass were decent, but I didn’t think they were as aesthetically pleasing since much of the scenery was barren brown and black dirt without anything to provide contrast.

A major negative of the hike were the long long stretches of trail through the forest at either ends of the hike, especially when we were on a fire road.

difficulty: 3. The difficulties with the Skyline isn’t so much the elevation profile, but rather the environmental elements that you likely have to endure. The amount of total elevation would probably earn this hike a 2 difficulty as majority of the elevation gain and loss are not that steep. It might be more difficult with a southbound hike as you’ll gain total more elevation. The thing that bothered us the most was the muddy trail on several sections. It didn’t seem like it was the easiest to keep our shoes dry and we wish we packed our gaiters for this hike rather than leaving it in the car. Lastly, we were blasted with some bad weather including high winds and cloud cover while on the ridge. Being on an open ridge makes it much easier for bad weather to influence your hike.

technical: 1. The trail is well marked and signed. Even in the heavy clouds on the ridge portion, we didn’t have any issues following the track. There are a couple minor stream crossings that could have the potential of being more than just hopping across a few rocks earlier in the season. Though earlier in the season may lead you to additional worries such as snow on the trail up to the Notch. So I would say this is a 1 with the potential of being higher.