's Chester Lake Snowshoe Trail
Chester lake trail is one of the most popular trails in the winter. It has the best of both worlds; ski and snowshoe trails. The 3.5 km (one way) trail is an easy trail that leads you to one of the prettiest lakes between mountain peaks in Peter Lougheed Provincial Park near Kananaskis Country. It leads you right up to the slopes of Mount Galatea, The Fortress and Mount Chester. Be prepared for company as this is a very busy trail. The view does make up for it a bit.
How to get to Chester Lake?
From the Kananaskis (#40) turn off at the #1 and head south for about 50km to the winter road closure and hang a right (west) onto Kananaskis Lakes Trail. After a couple kilometers you will want to make a right again (north) onto the Smith-Dorrien highway #742. After about 18km you will see the sign for Chester Lake on your right hand side.
The other option is to head straight south from Canmore on the #742, this is not bad if you drive a truck but for most cars the 45km of gravel road is a bit to much so the paved highway on the #40 is a better option.
Chester Lake Snowshoe Trip Log
As you pull into the parking lot you come face to face with one of the largest parking areas in the park. Parking is not hard to find even on peak days when there are NUMEROUS vehicles in the lot. The trailhead is on the north end so it is ideal to park closer there.
On the far north end of the parking lot you will see an outhouse. The trailhead is right behind this. At this point the trail is shared by snowshoers and skiers.
The trail starts off as a wide padded down trail, due to the amount of people travelling on snowshoes, until you come to a fork in the road where the trail spoilts off into 2. Follow the trail to the left where the trail marker leads you to.
The most important fork of the trail. If you are snowshoeing be sure to hang a right where the big sign of the person showshoeing is posted. The left is the cross country ski trail. With this being one of the most popular trails in the entire area its not uncommon to see people walking or snowshoeing on the ski trail. This is bad and ruins there tracks so please stay on the correct trail.
Soon after you start the trail starts to slowely head steadly upwards. It is clearly marked with bright orange diamonds every hundred meters or so. A few short sections give your calves and thighs a nice break.
Once you have gone upwards with what feels like a loong time, you come to a relatively flat area. The trail continues as a single track and the mountain views unfold infront of you.
The trail once again goes back through the thick forest through some more short, moderately steep sections before flattening out by a meadow.
Once you come to a large opening in the forest with a bright orange sign you have nearly reached the end. The rest is relativly flat with no more then a few meters in elevation drop and gain. Its by far one of the prettiest easy snowshoe trails in Kananaskis.
Follow the orange markers across the final flat snowy section to the last little bit of trees. Once you pass the trees, the view reopens underneath the vast slopes of Mount Chester, The Fortress and Mount Galatea.
GPS Plotted Route
The snowshoe trail is a bit shorter then the ski trail as it basically just heads straight up. The Ski trail (not pictured) goes a bit more north west from the start point before going back to Chester Lake.
On this trail you are heading mostly upwards. with the exception of the few flat parts. As you can see once you get to the last 800m or so from the lake the elevation does not gain/lose much at all.
If there is any change to the route you feel others should know about, shoot us an e-mail from our contact page.
