Chapter 2

The dream of a park warden, trampled. I spoke to Charlie*, a former park warden who tried for several years to combat the growing plague of amateur photographers at Joffre Lakes. He has witnessed the gradual degradation of his work environment in the line of fire of portable devices. Anxious and unhappy, he eventually threw in the towel and quit. It was Charlie’s dream to become a park warden for a long time. To him, getting hired was on par with winning the lottery: he felt so lucky to get to revel in solitude, to learn about the flora and fauna in all their various forms, and to protect them and educate people about them. But that feeling of luck evaporated about three years ago when Joffre Lakes started to be smothered under record numbers of visitors. “The workload increased, the park-use numbers skyrocketed, and these beautiful, sacred places began to feel like a Best Buy on Boxing Day,” Charlie says. Between 2000 and 2015, an average of 52,300 tourists visited the park. Last year was the most visited year in the park’s history, with 183,000 visitors—an unprecedented increase of 250 per cent. The 10 busiest days of the year saw an average of 2,300 people. In a report from June, BC Parks mentions a “dramatic increase.” *He asked if he could be interviewed anonymously, so his statements would not affect his professional advancement.

“It was already popular 20 years ago. But it’s just insanely popular now. You used to be able to get a parking spot,” says Stephen Hui, author of the book 105 Hikes In and Around Southwestern British Columbia. Joffre Lakes has even become a laughingstock for nature enthusiasts everywhere. “It’s the hike you refer to when you talk about a really crowded hike.” And this visitor traffic has had a direct impact on the atmosphere of the park, as well as on the work environment. “As I clean the first outhouse, a line quickly forms,” explains Charlie, describing a typical workday at Joffre Lakes. “People begin to get impatient and ask me to hurry up. I see a man leaving a bag of garbage behind a tree, but my hands are full. I watch a group of tourists feeding chips to a group of oversized, sick whisky jack birds. Behind me, a couple is doing a photo shoot for protein powder and are off trail damaging vegetation. I can’t keep up. And it’s slowly killing me.” According to Charlie, hikers from years past, who would arrive well-prepared, have given way to another kind of tourist: the kind that doesn’t care about the outdoors. “They saw a picture on Instagram or in a magazine, and they want that photo,” says Charlie. “Once they get there, their goal is to get on that trail and get out. They are not there to experience nature. Which is obviously super depressing…” They are also the kind of people who arrive with a coffee in hand and play music on their cellphones. The kind who don’t think to bring a bottle of water, and who wear flip-flops or little white sneakers, even when it’s raining and the ground is muddy. Or even high heels. And who end up barefoot, because the heels were too high and thus abandoned along the way.

“We started congratulating people for wearing hiking boots,” Charlie says glumly. Tweet

“No matter how many hours I spent at the trailhead or on the trail educating people, they’d continue to abuse the park. I was slowly starting to feel like an underpaid babysitter for a very disobedient parade of children,” says Charlie. “I felt like nothing I could do would save this park. No matter how fast I hiked, how much garbage I packed out, or how many times I scraped feces off the walls and ceilings of the outhouse. This was our new normal. Every single day.” Car Craze The parking lots were full when I visited the park. On the Saturday when I left, a few cars were even spilling out onto the highway, which is illegal—but it could have been worse. Charlie has seen cars parked all along the shoulder of the highway between Joffre Lakes and the neighbouring park, a dozen kilometres away. This chaotic situation calls to mind the statement by RCMP Corporal Mike Hamilton, obtained by photographer and hiker Steve Jones after an information access request. In a letter dated August 6, 2018, the corporal writes about having had to attempt to stop people from parking on the side of the highway. He gave up after two or three hours.

“I experienced what I can only describe as driver anarchy and mass crowds. I was nearly struck head-on by an inattentive motorist, I witnessed hikers standing and sitting in the middle of the highway taking photos, motorists stopped in the middle of the highway waiting for overflowing and unsafe parking lots to be vacated, and a complete disregard for anyone else’s safety,” writes Mike Hamilton. Charlie remembers feeling just as powerless. “I have to drive away and ignore it, there’s nothing I can do.” Birds of Joffre Lakes

The sky is blue, turquoise water sparkles in the sun. “Is it raining?” asks a woman, confused. Around her, five hands, palms open, stretch simultaneously toward the sky, as though to feel the raindrops.

But it’s not the weather patterns these people are interested in: it’s the birds.

Though the Instalog may be queen of #joffrelakes, the birds get their share of fame too. Many tourists lie in wait for them, crumbs in one hand, phone in the other.

Photo @MarcoSecchi The pictures are so popular they sometimes give a false impression. “A family asked if the petting zoo was at the top [of the mountain]. They thought they could feed bears and birds because they saw a photo of someone feeding the birds,” says Charlie.

It’s important to resist the desire to recreate this scene just for the sake of a nice photo. Feeding these grey jays puts their lives in danger.

“All summer long, they eat granola bars and Doritos and gummy worms.”

—Charlie

“When winter comes and everyone’s gone, they’ll forget to forage for their own food, and their habits will have changed. They might migrate down to the parking lot and wait for people there, or they just die.”

—Charlie Can Joffre Lakes Be Saved? According to Charlie, the problem isn’t just Instagram—it’s much more widespread. “I think social media is the culprit for the numbers, but I also think it’s a lack of education and a lack of there being any resources for people to learn this stuff.” Charlie wants funding allocated for nature interpreters and park wardens to be posted at the entrance to Joffre Lakes to explain to visitors that they are entering a protected wild space, and that it’s important to follow the rules in order to preserve the flora and fauna. “And BC Parks is not reducing the numbers in the park, so it’s not becoming this wilderness experience. It’s just this mass shopping mall of people.” Charlie is not alone voicing British Columbia Parks’ lack of funding. BC Liberal Member of Legislative Assembly Jordan Sturdy—who represents the West Vancouver–Sea to Sky riding, and who was mayor of Pemberton (where Joffre Lakes is located) for eight years—has voiced similar concerns. He believes the BC Parks annual budget—somewhere around $40 million—should be doubled. “Not every park needs more investment, because there are many parks that really just need to be left alone, such as wilderness parks that are preservation areas. But there are other parks, like Joffre Lakes, Garibaldi, and Porteau Cove, that are highly visited and could benefit from additional management and infrastructure.” Charlie couldn’t agree more. “If there was a park like that, that was being well funded, it would have picnic areas with staff that would be cleaning up; there wouldn’t be people all over the park eating and dropping their food and leaving garbage. It would be confined to a specific area.” The day after my visit at the end of June, BC Parks unveiled an action plan in response to the growing visitor traffic at Joffre Lakes. In the document, the government recognizes many of the issues Charlie points out, including that visitors are damaging the plant life and feeding wild animals. It also reports on the influx of people on the trails, the lack of toilets, and the danger posed by parking along the highway, not to mention the visitors’ lack of preparation. To solve the problems, the additional parking lot will be expanded by 200 spaces, to a total of 450 spaces. It was also announced that a shuttle service from the neighbouring park would be put in place, and that the Parkbus (a non-profit organization that offers shuttle transport from Vancouver) would improve its services. It was also announced that two First Nations supervisors would support the work of the park wardens. At present, three wardens oversee the entire Pemberton region. But they spend the majority of their time at Joffre Lakes. According to Charlie, having 14 people to monitor the masses wouldn’t be too many. In fact, it wouldn’t even be enough.