Day 5 - Hiking Day 5 - Sunday September 10 2017

Day 5 - Hiking Day 5 - Sunday September 10, 2017
Peninsula Section K 82.5 Bruin Street, Lions Bay Harbour to West of K 53.6 - Cape Dundas Parking Area located on private property at the end of Scenic Caves Rd. plus side trail
Distance: 29.91 k 
Time on the trail: 9:43

Today was all about the “light”. We started off in a beautiful deciduous forest. The light of the sun shone through the trees creating an atmosphere of joy. It seemed as if we were walking through a golden forest.  The underbrush too shone in the filtered sunlight.  As on previous days we walked out on the edge of the cliffs high above the lake walking on rocky, rooted paths where we clung to the inner side of the trail because on the other you would plunge to your death. Here the sunlight sparkled on the lake like a mantle of twinkling stars. Along the trail were incredible geological formations: a creepy cave with a hole to the sky; huge holes dug in the ground; the limestone overhangs looked as if they might collapse at any minute and tumble down into the aqua water below; an amazing rock with a bridge over a massive hole; trees growing along the top of the bridge, and open to the rocks below. The great thing about today was the variation in the landscape we were walking through. The trail was generally tough with ups and downs over solid rock, slippy tree roots, requiring an innate amount of concentration.  Up to the stony grassy tops of the cliffs or down through the rocks and boulders to the forests below. We felt we were turning into “cliff goats”. At times we were walking along the pebbles and rocks of the boulder beaches with the aqua water stretching out for endless miles beyond the vision.

We also spent about 10k on the road where the wild flowers lining the road brought beauty to our eyes: blue cornflower, white and purple daisies,  yellow golden rod. We  passed interesting homes some of which appeared to be “cottages” and yet were far too big to be used only spasmodically.

We tackled several stair cases, mainly in the last section, and hard to negotiate when your limbs have stiffened up after constant walking. Based on these the stairs at the end of the Squamish 50 were easy!!

Our last hurdle of the day was the “boulder field” coming into the car park. Even the boulders are beautiful though,  varied in size and shape and covered with lime-green moss. The lush green grass on the last 100 metres of the journey smelled sweet!

We had scheduled our hike to end at K 57.4 - Rush Cove Side Trail, but Doug, our host at the Lion Heart Guest House, advised us to lengthen today's hike in order to shorten a more difficult hike tomorrow, which we did by about 4 k.

We are perfecting our evenings: stumble into the guest house, unpack our back packs, get lunch ready for the next day, then wine, ah sigh!! Half freshen up, head for dinner. Back to the guest house, lay out clothes for next day. Catch up on texts (WiFi doesn't work); and sleep!