The road is gravel, but is well maintained and any car can handle it. In the winter this road is plowed.
Driving time from Vancouver to the Phacelia Creek Road turnoff is typically 3 to 4 hours each way, depending on traffic and weather. Driving time from the East trailhead to the West trailhead is about 3 hours. Ensure to plan your trip in coordination with the Lytton Ferry.
In summer, drive 2. The road can be managed by 2WD vehicles. About 1. There is a parking around the area for about 6 cars. The access to the cabin is most comprised of the old Lizzie Lake Road. Once at the lake, the road ends and to get to the cabin you follow the Lizzie Creek Cabin Trail. The Upper Bypass trail is about 1km long. After 8km, turn right to stay on the 99 well signed in the town of Mt. You can park here at the start of the Lizzie FSR if you have a wimpy or shiny car or drive up 1.
Parts are a bit steep, but it is do-able with a 2WD. There is a bit of parking there. Prior to you could drive 10km up Lizzie Creek all the way to a campground at Lizzie Lake, but major washouts that year changed all that.
The main washout occurred at a spot where Lizzie Creek meanders against a 30 meter high cliff on the north side. When the logging road was built it was routed entirely on the north side except for this spot, where the road briefly crossed over and back rather than climbing over the cliff.
So the road used to have two bridges about m apart but now both are washed out. Now you have a choice between 3 options: two bypass trails on the north side of the creek above the cliff, or crossing the creek twice.
The best choice is the new bypass trail above in green which starts 1. This old trail climbs and descends steeply and it sucks. For years this was the only trail, so I recommended crossing the creek on logs or fording it , but the trail is much nicer and faster, especially if you park up at its entrance instead of the lower parking spot. In low water, you can ford the creek or cross the indicated logs to go around. The logs work pretty much anytime of year but at high flows a slip off into the raging creek could be fatal.
I do this in late summer to save a little time. There are some nice old growth trees some of the last in the Lizzie valley and calypso orchids on the south side. There are a few old spur roads but they have been long been overtaken by alder but look like roads mid-winter. Sweeter would be an eBike that you could pedal up the incline of the logging road, yet still light enough to toss over the occasional fallen log, and then later rip back out.
The final access point is Texas Creek in the NE corner. There is info on this access point on the park website. This led to a reasonably well developed trail halfway up the river to Cottonwood Creek but little else. These trails were hastily cut with little thought put into the actual route and most have disappeared from both maps and the forest. Today there are only a few discernible trails in the park, which are shown above and described at the end.
Even these, with the exception of the main valley trail, are best thought of as access tools rather than attractions. The Stryen Creek Trail officially delisted in because it crosses private property at the start and Cottonwood Creek trail reclassified to a route in but still reasonable walking provide access to the southern and northern alpine respectively.
The focus of the guide is on long traverses via foot, packraft or ski. Despite the lack of good trails, these trips are made possible by the Wisconsin glaciation which covered and rounded off most of the alpine ridges but not the peaks in the Stein, making for an alpine that is both outstandingly scenic and surprisingly efficient to traverse.
These ridges are a great way to link together peaks, lakes and glaciers. Thus it is a great spring destination March — May and sometimes you can go camping right through the winter. The flip side of this is that it can be extremely hot in July and August. Besides the friendly weather, there is also no fees, a relatively flat trail and plenty of neat attractions including fishing, pictographs and old cabins and caves to hunt out.
Lower valley camping starts from the eastern Lytton trailhead. Most folks stick to the first 13km, where there are frequent campsites every km with outhouses and bear caches unreservable, no fees. Walk as far as you please, camp and hike back. The campsites are Loop Camp km 2. There are many areas when you can camp in this section as well, but the official sites are Lean To km 17 , Ponderosa km 22 and Cottonwood km See the trails description section for further info.
What it really is from east to west is 15 km of pretty good trail, 42km of mostly poor-okay trail with a few nice spots, 28km of incredible alpine and then a 12km green alder tunnel down an old logging road. For more details, see section 9 trail descriptions.
The traverse is a great trip but almost entirely due to the alpine and adjacent lakes Stein, Lizzie. Those who are happy to accept below average trail for a more remote experience will be delighted. With that said, major trail work was done in and and this substantially improved the main trail. The worst part — the alder covered burn zone from around Avalanche Creek — has been vastly improved, and the entire valley trail was cleared of deadfall of course some more has since fallen.
A windstorm in fall did add a moderate amount of new deadfall to the trail, but overall the trail is WAY better than it was prior to The traditional suggestion for the Stein Traverse See G. Starting from the west is easier in that you gain elevation gently on a former logging road rather than a steep trail up from Stein Lake. It also lets you have a recent weather forecast for the exposed alpine section. So I recommend starting from the east. It also lines you up for incredible post trip eats in Pemberton at either the Pony or Mile One Eatery, rather than the limited fare served in Lytton.
That trip walks the ridge between the Cottonwood and Scudamore valleys, and roughly doubles the alpine on the traverse. The main criticism of the Stein Traverse is that the effort is high relative to the alpine it crosses, which some of my trip suggestions seek to improve. Both the length and difficulty of the access are substantial, so you have to enjoy this sort of semi-suffering adventure.
Day 2: Hike to Cottonwood Camp km 29 or Logjam camp km Day 3: Hike to Avalanche Camp km 47, good camp from Cottonwood or to a nice unofficial river side camp km 52 just prior to the upper cable crossing if you were at log jam.
Day 4: Arrive at Stein lake km 57, mediocre camp , relax and go fishing. At the river, it follow the valley trail east 30km to the river mouth. The downside of the mini traverse is the alpine is limited and over quickly. Much better still would be turning west when you reach the Stein River to hike the bulk of the main traverse, rather than the shorter exit east to Lytton. This last 2km is talus slopes with occasional cairns and trail makers, but no obvious trail when I was there.
However, trail work in supposedly modified this route so it is more obvious and also re-routed somewhat so it reaches the Stein river a bit further east from Cottonwood Creek. Once you are a top the talus, the trail becomes obvious.
Where the two forks of Cottonwood Creek meet is a reasonably developed campsite picnic table, bear bin. A reasonable southbound itinerary is to hike to the forks of Cottonwood Creek on day 1, Stein River on day 2, the suspension bridge on day 3 and finish on day 4. There are only three marked trails in the Stein, as shown above. The main valley trail runs east-west across the park. The Stryen Creek trail is the short trail on the eastern side, while the Cottonwood Creek trail splits off from the main river trail mid-valley and runs northwest over Blowdown Pass until it hits a driveable logging road in north of the park along Blowdown Creek.
The first 13km to the suspension bridge is good walking, although quite hot in mid summer. Good camps are found every few kilometers. This section is the highest used area in the park. Just after a nice camp at km 13 the trail crosses to the north side of the river via a suspension bridge and remains good walking for another 2km. After this point, the trail sees less use.
From km 15 to the Ponderosa Shelter km 21 the trail is a mix of good forest walking and mildly brushy walking near the river with alder, rosehips and horsetail. Camping at the Ponderosa shelter built is a bit gloomy, as the shelter is run down. The actual Ponderosa camp is 5 minutes further across the creek and is nicer. The trail itself currently skirts the Ponderosa shelter, so you might miss it entirely, which is fine.
This section is more of the same half brushy, half good walking with some talus thrown in, until the last 3km, which is fast forest walking. There used to be quite a bit of riparian trail that was rather brushy, but most of these sections were re-routed in so the walking is generally better.
The only exception is a few talus fields, where the trail disappears for a few hundred meters and you need a keen eye to follow the cairns. When you arrive at Cottonwood Creek there is a nice camping area, a fire ring, map and an outhouse. Cottonwood falls is worth the 5 minute hike upstream.
The actual trail up the Cottonwood valley starts a minute back at the signed junction. Cross Cottonwood Creek via the bridge just downstream of camp the cable car has been removed. Cross Scudamore Creek around km 33 via the new cable car and then arrive at Logjam camp km Feels a bit gloomy to me. For the next 7km the trail follows the river. Around km 44 the trail climbs away from the river until km You should be able to do 2.
Water is 2 minutes further west at the creek. If you can manage, going another 5km to camp at the river km 51 is better. After Avalanche camp the trail skirts the side wall for a few more moderately tough kms before descending a talus field to the Stein River km 51 and from here the walking is good to Stein Lake. In the next few kms are several incredible stands of old growth Douglas Fir and Cedar. You can walk along the south shore if you want to do some fishing Rainbow Trout!
From Stein Lake, cross the outflow via the cable car. Instead, follow the main trail east for a while until the ascent to the alpine begins. Shortly after you reach the top, the trail markers end. The rest of the route is now unmarked until Lizzie Cabin except for hiker built cairns, which are frequent.
The footpath is pretty well worn in the alpine so despite the lack of markers the route is usually easy to follow. The exception to this is for eastbound hikers trying to find the marked trail to descend to Stein Lake from the alpine.
This can be tough, as the markers are sparse and faded near the ridge, while the trail is eroded and vague and over the years hikers have worn in many faint paths. What people are saying. Jul Take the free reaction ferry which holds only 2 vehicles per crossing to the Stein Valley Park.
It is such a unique experience with cables holding the ferry in the water and uses the power of the rushing waters of the Fraser river to propel it across. Take a short drive to the park and drive in a few km to the parking non paved road with some rocks Beautiful scenic hike along the rushing river where you encounter a bridge and the "Asking Rock".
You can take a much longer hike but this is all we had time for on this trip. Beautiful and unique experience and well worth the trip! There are no services so take whatever you need. Oct After spending a night in Lytton, we took the very small free ferry across the river to this park. It was beautiful, we hiked a short while but could have gone on for miles. It seems pretty remote so bring water and snacks if you will be there for a while. Full view. All photos Tours and Tickets.
Thompson River Rafting Day Trip. Write a review Upload a photo. Most Recent. Very good. Family M New Westminster, Canada 33 contributions. Beautiful trails and great experience! Read more. Rebecky April 27, Sebastian Rakowski. September 5, Chelsea Verzola. September 3, July 21, Bryan Madu. June 24, Jeff Zeller. March 2, Great spot for an easy early season camp.
Michelle McEachern. July 29, Ryam Mitchel. January 31, First to Review. September 21, September 20, Maria Pia. Richard Lamarche. June 19, Kristina Collins.
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