DeBeck’s Hill

July 5, 2024

469m

Squamish, BC

“DeBeck’s Hill” is one of those unofficially-named P100m bumps in the vicinity of Squamish. I had no rush to bag those objectives as I wanted to save them for some unique circumstances. Back in 2016 I did “Mt. Crumpit” with a new hiker and then in 2020 I climbed “Mt. Chek” via the sport climbing route Frontside 180. This time Erica estimated to have about 5-6 hours available (home to home) and was keen to join me for another short hike as this would be our last chance seeing each other before my 2-month international trip. I eventually decided on DeBeck’s Hill but we would also spent an hour sport climbing at Smoke Bluffs so she could make use of her brand new rock shoes. To further complicate things I had another trip planned later in the evening and the itinerary was to leave Surrey at 5:30 pm, but I would focus on one trip at a time. It turned out that I barely made back home in time for the evening trip, and Erica was also late for work by about an hour and half, but that’s okay in the end.

The original plan was to pick Erica up at 9:45 am but that got pushed to 10 am and we also needed to stop for some grocery in Squamish. The traffic volume was also quite heavy and so was the parking situation at the trail-head. I thought about taking the longer north ridge but given the time constraint I eventually opted for the easiest way, which was to plod up a gated access road on the east slope. The parking lot was basically the day-use area for Alice Lake so it was completely full, but I was able to park the vehicle without having to wait for too long, by somewhat cutting into the line. This really upset someone waiting there longer than us, but I wasn’t going to give that spot to them.

There wasn’t that much worth noting about the hike itself as we essentially just plodded up a deactivated service road, and that road runs all the way to the summit. We together only carried my summit pack so Erica did not have to carry anything. The true summit was occupied by some communication towers but there were some views from slightly under the summit to the west. We firstly went to check out the viewpoints and then tagged the actual high point. We then dashed down the road and checked out the busy lakeshore. I had never actually seen Alice Lake so I wanted to at least touch the water. Our round trip time was just over 1 hour.

As you can see we just followed the road

Me on DeBeck’s Hill with Alpha Mountain etc. behind

Erica and I on the viewpoint under the summit

I made Erica to tag the true summit as well

We then went down to the shore to check out Alice Lake

I knew we weren’t doing great on time but I had promised to take Erica out for some rock climbing so I must put that in realization. The simplest spot was the Parking Lot Wall as recommended by Alex B., and sure it was easy going. There’s essentially no approach, and the left side wall was extremely easy. We all went around to the top and made a rappel down, and then I made Erica to do two laps (5.4 ish terrain) while I gave her top-rope belay. Unfortunately we had to call it after the two runs as I would otherwise not be able to make the timeline. The afternoon rush hour traffic was one of the worst I’ve ever seen, that it took us almost 2 hours from Squamish to Burnaby and there was zero accident en route. I eventually got back home with about 20 minutes to spare, and I did earn myself enough time to take a quick shower before getting picked up by my next group of friends.