Keyhole Hot Springs(aka Pebble Creek)
Recreation Sites and Trails BC have closed Keyhole Hot Springs with the reason being: "Keyhole Falls Trail will be closed from April 1st to November 15th yearly. This seasonal closure is in place to support the recovery of the local Grizzly Bear population." Keyhole Hot Springs(sometimes called Pebble Creek Hot Springs) is located 100 kilometres from Whistler(Village Gate Blvd). Though most of the 100k is on logging roads, it is drivable by most cars without any trouble. The massive Innergex hydroelectric project is well underway in the area, turning a once quiet wilderness into a war-zone. On the plus side, the old logging roads near Keyhole Hot Springs are now well maintained and smooth. 2014 saw the permanent closing of the old hot springs trail and a new trail built. Another benefit of the construction is the year-round maintenance of the access road which allows access to the springs even in the winter. The spectacular Keyhole Falls is located just a couple kilometres upriver from the hot springs and very close to ground zero of the Innergex mammoth construction effort. If you are brave enough to drive to the Keyhole Falls trail, just continue driving past the Lillooet River Trail. You will see a large, unmarked parking area and hard to find trail just before the km 50(don't cross the bridge). If you have doubts that you are parking in the right spot, just get out of your vehicle and listen for a moment. The deep rumbling of Keyhole Falls can be faintly heard from where you park. Climb the gravel embankment(don't cross the vehicle bridge) and look for the faint trail, then follow the faint rumbling from the falls as it soon becomes a thundering echo far below. The trail is just a couple hundred metres long from the parking area. The reason you have to be brave to get to Keyhole Falls is because of the colossal war zone you have to drive through to get to it. It is a bit daunting, however, access to the area is still allowed. You just have to be very aware of being considerate to the massive construction vehicles scrambling to get the job done. There are large signs indicated where you cannot go, which makes navigating to the falls more manageable.
The new Lillooet River Trail is well marked with flagging tape and tree reflectors as well as the occasional bench to sit on. Just like the old trail, this new trail is often challenging to navigate. Though it is rarely steep, as the old trail mostly is, this one is a zig-zag through a thick forest and occasional scramble through truck sized boulders. The trail, at a moderate pace should take about a half an hour from your car to the springs. If you have any interest in geology, however, the trail may take you hours. The crumbing cliffs reveal an astounding array of recent volcanic activity and you find yourself staring in amazement at the extraordinarily beautiful rocks.
Sitting in the springs you look across to the vertical rock face and the massive, truck sized chunks of it that lay in the river next to you. The Lillooet is fed from various glaciers and snowy mountains visible all the way to Pemberton. At the Lillooet River crossing in Pemberton Meadows take a look in the distance and you will make out the spectacularly jagged and violent looking peak of Mount Meager. It is also a good place to reflect on the fact that Mount Meager produced the larges volcanic eruption in Canada, in the last ten thousand years. It occurred about 2400 years ago and Keyhole and Meager Creek Hot Springs are symptoms of current volcanic activity and another major eruption is possible. For such a remote place, the Keyhole Hot Springs have a pretty elaborate hot springs layout as well as a very large(unmaintained) camping area in the deep forest, high above the hot springs about a 10 minute walk away. Signs of semi-permanent tarp dwellings can be seen in stages of ruin, but overall the campsite area is amazing. With the exception of being dark due to the thick forest and fresh water a steep, 5 minute walk away, it is perched on a wonderful cliff with great views of the river below and cliff and mountains and waterfalls across. If the campsite had a dozen tents within it, you could space them out enough to not see or hear each other fairly easily.
As with the other hot springs near Whistler getting to them is half the fun, and with Keyhole Hot Springs this is particularly so. Setting off from Whistler Village and onto the Sea to Sky Highway heading north, you have quiet a few potential pit-stops along the way. Five minutes along you come to the obvious pull-out viewpoint at the right side edge of the highway and overlooking Green Lake. This vantage point is great on a cloudy day, but fantastic on a sunny day. A painted mural depicts the mountains laid out in front of you. Wedge Mountain, Blackcomb Mountain and Whistler Mountain dominate the skyline. Green Lake, unnaturally looking emerald green, a result of glacial silt reflecting the light.
Pemberton is just 5 minutes north of Nairn Falls and at the traffic lights with the Petro Can on your left and McDonald's across to your right, you need to turn left onto Portage Road. This is your last chance for food, drinks and gas before leaving civilization. There is an excellent Pub/Restaurant immediately on your left, next to the Petro Can gas station. On your first right there is a great coffee shop called Mt Currie Coffee Company. Their drip coffee is garbage but everything else is amazing. A block or two further down Portage road and you come to a roundabout. Turn left at the roundabout, cross the train tracks. On your left is a cold beer and wine store and a small grocery store. Straight ahead and you come to a T junction and stop sign. If you turn left here you will see a dollar store with cheap, bulk candles(great for hot springs). Up from the dollar store and right at the Police Station and you will come to a government liquor store and a cheaper and wider selection of booze choices than the beer and wine store. Back at the T junction there is also a large grocery store and there you will find the cheapest and widest selection of grocery food and they also have a great deli with lots of prepared sandwiches, pizza, etc. To continue to Keyhole Hot Springs turn right at the T junction and follow the signs for Pemberton Meadows and you are about to leave civilization. Pemberton Meadows Road is a great country road that runs almost constantly within sight of the Lillooet River until you arrive at the hot springs. The road is very straight, paved, wide and very long. For 25 kilometres you drive past dozens of idyllic farms, endless grassy fields and horses and cows everywhere you look. Keep an eye out for the turnoff 25k from Pemberton(for better driving directions see below). This right turn takes you to the start of the Upper Lillooet Forest Service Road.
The paved road ends after the bridge that crosses the Lillooet River and the bumpy, dusty, Upper Lillooet Forest Service Road begins, now with the Lillooet River on your left. For the first few kilometres you don't see much through the forest, but soon the the trees open up and you catch your first great views of the Lillooet River. It sits in a massive, once glacier filled valley and surrounded on either side with untouched, snow capped mountains. There are a couple fantastic places to stop and take in the view and here you will notice the first remnants of the massive slide of 2010. In 2010 a catastrophic mud and debris slide let loose from Mount Meager, flinging, it has been estimated, over 48.5 million cubic metres of debris down from Capricorn Glacier at a speed of 30 metres per second. Making it the largest recorded landslide in the history of Canada. It filled the The debris field is still visible today, still grey and eerie looking. The whole valley still looks dead and very little vegetation has returned. Enormous tree trunks lay, twisted in the river and ghostly white and long dead trees still stand at the edges of the valley. Killed by the the flood or the aftermath, they make the place look amazingly surreal. The shape of the valley and possibly the way the two valleys join not far from this area for some reason cause it to be like a wind tunnel most days. The wind blasts through the debris field, yet 200 metres away, next to your car, there is no wind at all. What a great place.
The beautiful new trail begins in quite an unexpectedly wonderful way. From the dusty old logging road parking area, you enter the forest and immediately find yourself in a large forest clearing with massive cedars all around. You feel as though you have instantly left civilisation. A large, well loved fire ring sits in the middle of this clearing and you notice that you could fit several tents here if you had to. The area is very flat and inviting. A trailhead sign and small map indicate the where you will The trail then continues through deep forest and along a frighteningly chaotic boulder field with house sized boulders filling a chasm between cliffs. There is also an amazing little waterfall that tumbles over the cliff about 15 metres up and looks like a giant shower. Further along the trail you come to the nicely constructed bridge over the one rushing river along the trail. If you ever parked at the old trailhead, this is the river you drove through just before parking. The aptly named(when you had to drive through it back in the day), "Truckwash Creek" is a massive torrent of water plowing through the valley. About 5 minutes past this bridge you come to the Keyhole Hot Springs campsite. The area is entirely unmaintained and aside from an elaborate bear hang area to keep your food, there are no amenities such as outhouses, signs, etc.
The water pooling in the sandy pools is amazingly hot and suddenly you realize you are in nirvana. A small wooden bench and indiscreet fire-pit sits next to the pool and someone has left a shovel to dig out the pool. The pool is surrounded by a cliff at your back, and huge boulders and the Lillooet River just a few metres away. Continuing along the path through the huge boulders you come to the two fantastic, cemented in pools on the cliff-side dipping into the river. Some weeks the lower pool floods and is too cold, but if you catch it at the right level it is paradise. Once again, you have a short scramble down a tree trunk to get to these pools. But once you are there, you will never want to get out. The Keyhole Hot Springs are pretty amazing. Keyhole Hot Springs - Trailhead Directions from Whistler
From Whistler Drive north on Highway 99 until you reach Pemberton.
When you reach Pemberton turn left at the traffic lights(gas station) and after 1k you will come to a roundabout, left here and drive 200 metres to the T junction, you will see a sign for "The Meadows" turn right here and and another "The Meadows" sign in a couple hundred metres pointing left. Head NW from Pemberton on Pemberton Meadows road for 25km and turn right onto Upper Lillooet Forest Service Road. This cuts you across, and in between two huge farm fields and then crosses a bridge high above the river then turns sharply left. The image above showing horses was taken along this section between the farm fields just before the bridge. You will notice after you cross the bridge that the Upper Lillooet FSR has kilometre markings posted on the right side of the road starting here. You don't really need to zero your odometer here, as you can just use these road KM markers instead which are used below. Be careful to keep left at 9km (right goes to Gold Bridge via Hurley Pass)
At 36k you will see the massive mudslide carnage of 2010 on your left and an amazing place to pull over and look around. It is amazing to think that 2013 was when the plants and trees finally managed to significantly return here. In 2012, the area was still a wasteland of debris. This aerial video was take in the fall of 2014. At km 37 continue straight past the Meager Creek turn-off on your left, which is now a mound of dirt(sometimes car sized boulders) blocking the road that once was the giant bridge to Meager Creek Hot Springs. Look for the very old sign on your right, "Meager Creek Hot Springs - Closed". Don't forget to stop here and marvel at the surreal road to nowhere(also pictured above). Just past km 42(see map below) look for the new parking area on the right(room for about 15 cars). There is a very small "Lillooet River Trail" sign now, but soon there will likely be a much larger sign. The best thing to keep an eye out for is the tell-tale parking area on the right that looks out of place along an endless logging road. Last year there was an outhouse here, though it may or may not be there this summer. Across from the parking area is the obvious trail and small trail sign... and in the forest a nice little trail map sign to indicate where you are going. The trail is less than 2 kilometres to Keyhole Hot Springs, and fairly easy to follow. If you venture out in low light and without a headlight, you will lose the trail easily. This is a very dangerous trail to get lost on as the cliffs on your right are steep, high and crumbling and on the left the river is fast moving and flanked by similarly steep and crumbling slopes.
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