The Crack, Killarney Provincial Park
I visited Killarney Provincial Park with the family at the beginning of July. It was on my bucket list for a very, very long time, since the days I arrived to Canada 20 years ago.
In the first days being in Canada I saw a picture on the board of one of my supervisors at York University and the landscape entered into my awareness. After our visit I have to say it lived up to the hype.
One of the favorite trail for the whole family was the Chikanishing Trail. The winding Chikanishing Creek, the rugged coastline, the rocks were magical during the sunset light.
But here I want to write about the more hyped “The Crack” trail, which we ended up hiking twice, with our nine year old. We inquired about the trail at the George Lake visitor centre. They said that it is a very difficult trail and we should plan around 4–5 hours for the 7km out-and-back hike.
We started out at around 2pm with each of us having half liter of water and snacks. The first part of the trail, around 2km is very easy, we did it in half an hour, the last kilometer is a bit harder, but I wouldn’t call it “highly difficult” as the board at the beginning of the trail is putting it. Yeah, there are some larger steps you have to take to climb over rocks and one has to use their hands also sometimes, but with patience and perseverance this last km is also doable in around 1 hour.
So much so, that I planned to shoot at sunset but at 4pm we already reached the peak and took in the sights and there were around 4 more hours until sunset. I also saw that I would be shooting into the sun towards sunset so I decided not to wait and head back. We picked a lot of blueberries on our way back and including the long rest on the peak the whole hike was about 4 hours, not difficult.
Next morning it was supposed to be rainy but after sunrise I saw that the clouds are clearing up, so I decided to hike “The Crack” again, hoping for better light. We had breakfast at George Lake and started our hike at around 8:30AM. Skies looked good, still clear and all of us, including our nine year old son in good spirits.
After reaching the steeper part I noticed that a large cloud front is coming in so I decided to push it harder, maybe I can take a few shots before the front covers the Sun. So I went ahead and reached the peak at around 9:35, my wife and son coming in around 5 minutes later. I did not have too much luck, the light was meh, the previous day in the afternoon was still better. But we did the hike to the peak in one hour and a few minutes. Not bad with a nine year old. We took our time again, I took a couple dozen pictures and decided to head back. The way back was around one hour, so in total it took us a bit more than two hours to hike the trail. The Titan bars and snacks helped. Of course if the rocks are wet, that can slow you down and you have to be more careful but otherwise in good weather the hike itself is doable in around three hours comfortably.
