I seriously do not condone this and I understand that what I did was wrong and dangerous, might get downvoted to hell, but I'm gonna share anyway

There is a hike in my province that's been blowing up like crazy with instagrammers over the past few years (Joffrey Lake) because not only does it have some of the most beautiful views in our province's hikes but it's also fairly accessible (only 2hrs hike) and only a 1-2hr drive from a popular tourist ski village (Whistler).

I mean, they have built THREE big parking lots just to try to support the demand of tourists visiting this poor place.

During the peak of COVID, a lot of our hikes were put on a free reservation system to control overcrowding. But this place, Joffrey, they just shut it down for a good long time because I'm assuming even with daily reservations (which for other hikes have booked within 2mins of opening) it would be hard to control the population. So they just completely shut it down, blocked off the parking lots and put a very weak blockade at the entrance.

I had never done the hike though I had done a couple of the others in my province, and while I really did want to do the hike, I didn't want it to be with 1million instagrammers (I myself don't have Instagram or other social media; I just wanted to do the hike for the beauty of the place).

So.....I convinced my very hesitant dad and my 2 cousins to break into the park, lol. My dad parked a decent distance at another non related site, we hiked up, only came across 2 others who coming down and they told us there was only 1 person up there (who we never ended up seeing. Kind of creepy but 🤷‍♀️).

And my goodness, it was probably the thing in my life that I am most fortunate for because such a thing will likely never happen again, I'll never have that opportunity again. And yes the hike was incredibly breathtaking, made more so by the emptiness and solitude, and my gratitude for being able to do it under these conditions

A few weeks prior, I had gone on another popular hike (though this one is less accessible as it's 4-6+hrs each way) (Garibaldi lake), and this one was on a strictly controlled reservation system (took me 3 days to get 2 tickets), so while the population was controlled it was still quite crowded, I mean, enough to annoy my introverted ass, and as beautiful as the hike was, it was just ruined by the more-than-a-few people walking alongside the lake. It just made me all the more grateful for being able to hike Joffrey with no other visitors. A once in a million experience that I can only wish for