The Alpine Club of Canada (ACC) has just announced a coming addition to the ACC’s hut network, a new hut at Robson Pass: “More than two decades in the planning, when completed it will serve as a gateway to the highest peak in the Canadian Rockies and the surrounding area. The hut will be at Robson Pass, 24 km from the Mount Robson Visitor Information Centre, and about 2 km from Berg Lake Campground. The hut will sleep 12 people and will include innovative design features and a new approach to ACC hut construction. It uses hybrid timber-frame 2-story construction with sustainable exterior materials. Renewable energy will be supplied by solar panels.”

See more details on the ACC website.

Of local historical interest, early in the planning process, 18 years ago this month, Dave King and I flew into Berg Lake with the ACC’s then Director of Facilities to look at potential sites. The two main locations then under consideration were near the existing BC Parks ranger cabin, and farther north at Robson Pass. At that time the ACC was also considering the possibility of using hydropower, and the timing of our late winter trip was to assess water flow possibilities.

Both the ranger cabin site and a hydro option were essentially ruled out on that trip. The water flow, even in the main Toboggan Creek (which wasn’t an option because of its proximity to the main campground) was completely inadequate at that time of year. The ranger hut is in a superb location, but that would have left the ACC hut at a lesser location and too close to the existing hut. An alternative option that was briefly discussed was to incorporate the ranger facility in the new ACC hut, but that was not thought desirable for BC Parks and their ranger staff, nor for the ACC’s traditional approach to their mountain huts. The result is that the new hut will be built at Robson Pass, and will use solar for its renewable energy.

View a 4-minute video of that trip, ‘Mount Robson in Winter’ here.

A driver for the ACC initiative was that BC Parks was then entertaining proposals for what they called “roofed accommodation” at Mount Robson, and there was concern among local park users that this would be a high-end facility catering more to the well-heeled than to the general public. Therefore, an ACC hut is a very nice compromise that also fits well with the ACC’s history and BC Park’s inclusivity. The ACC notes that “Mount Robson Provincial Park and Robson Pass have long held a special place in ACC’s history. The club’s General Mountaineering Camp has been held in the area on four occasions, and the club’s 1913 exploratory summer camp resulted in the first ascent of the mountain.” As well, there was another very significant historical event at Robson Pass as it was chosen as the location for the ceremony marking the completion of the BC/Alberta boundary survey in 1924 during another ACC Mount Robson camp that saw the first female ascents of Mount Robson by BC’s Phyllis Munday and American, Annette Buck.

For more in-depth information on this topic, view two previous FMCBC Cloudburst editions book reviews:

  1. Cloudburst #1 Article: Surveying the 120th Meridian & The Great Divide: The Alberta-BC Boundary Survey, 1918-1924
  2. Cloudburst #2 Article: Surveying The Great Divide


-Written by Mike Nash, Caledonia Ramblers Outdoor Club