Egypt Lake one of the first multi-day backcountry trips I went on in the Canadian Rockies.
One of the trailheads to access Egypt Lake is at Sunshine Village Ski Resort, just west of Banff. The plan was to hike in over Healy Pass to Egypt Lake.
Starting after work, we hiked in 5.5 km to Healy Creek, a nicely situated campground on the river accessed by a well graded track. Being early July, we still had daylight until 10pm and whipped up some pasta as the sun was fading.
The next day, we awoke to beautiful weather and decided to make the most of it hiking in over Simpson Pass, a wide open expanse of meadows which gave views to Mt Assiniboine Provincial Park and beyond. The trail climbed fairly steeply and was rocky, careful footing in some places.
Within a few more kilometres we started to get some views towards Healy Pass, and boy was it spectacular. This was my first mountain pass in the Rockies, and it was not going to disappoint on such a spectacular day. We passed through meadows and open valley views to the many mountains surrounding us, and then crested the 2330m pass and it was time for lunch.
Healy Pass is magnificent. You can see across to Egypt, Scarab and Mummy Lakes, back towards Mt Assiniboine and in all directions, snow capped mountains were there to greet us. It was a super hot day but luckily some wind helped cool us down on the pass.
After lunch, we continued down the winding path and started to descend to our spot for the night, Egypt Lake campground. This campground is quite a large one with 15 sites, but is well situated in a big grassy clearing.
The Egypt Lake Shelter sits prettily just before the campground, and is a good option for those who want to have a cosier experience, travel lighter or have a shelter from the storm in poorer weather.
After setting up the tent we went to explore Egypt and Scarab lakes. Egypt lake was beautiful, complete with some nice sitting rocks, so we had a quick look then decided to continue on the scrambly path up to Scarab lake some 200m higher. We met a little snow so decided on dinner there instead of heading higher to Mummy Lake. Scarab lake was stunning, especially with a bit of snow still around.
We enjoyed the rest of the evening hanging out on Egypt Lake before stumbling back into the campground around dark, attempting to hang our food and attractants up on the bear hang in the diminishing light. It’s amazing what a couple of glasses of wine can do after a long day in the sun!
