Black Mountain, Cypress: A 6 km Loop to a Summit Full of Lakes
The most under-rated hike at Cypress, because everyone walks past the junction on their way to St Mark's or Eagle Bluffs. Six kilometres buys you a lake-covered summit plateau at 1,217 m with views in every direction.
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Quick facts
- Distance
- 6 km
- Elevation gain
- 336 m
- Highest point
- 1,217 m
- Difficulty
- Moderate
- Time needed
- 2.5-4 hours
- Route type
- Loop
- Season
- Roughly July to October snow-free, with Cabin Lake warm enough to swim in late July and August. Snow-covered from late November to May, when it is one of three maintained backcountry winter trails at Cypress.
- Drive from Vancouver
- 45 min
- Transit accessible
- Yes
- Dog friendly
- Yes
- Pass or permit
- No pass requiredNo BC Parks day-use pass is required at Cypress. For 2026 the day-pass parks are Joffre Lakes, Garibaldi and Golden Ears in summer and Mount Seymour in winter. Cypress is on neither list. From November 1 to May 31 you do need a free backcountry access corridor (BAC) tag to cross the resort ski area to reach this trail. Tags are free, come from the self-registration area in the Black Mountain Lodge, and are checked at the resort gate.
- Last hiked
- Traditional territory
- Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Úxwumixw (Squamish), səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) and xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam) territory
On this page5 sections
Black Mountain is the trail almost nobody at Cypress is actually doing. On a summer Saturday the parking lot empties in two directions, north to St Mark's Summit and south-west to Eagle Bluffs, and the loop that climbs to the 1,217-metre summit plateau in between gets a fraction of the traffic. That is a mistake, because the plateau is the strangest and best piece of ground at Cypress: a broad shoulder of granite covered in small lakes, stunted hemlock and heather, with the Lions to the north and Vancouver to the south.
Six kilometres, 336 metres of climbing, and about two and a half hours if you are moving. Four if you swim.
The route
Start at the wooden trail-map sign at the north end of the Cypress Bowl downhill lots. Follow the Baden-Powell Trail, which climbs steeply along the edge of the ski runs for the first stretch. This is the least attractive part of the day and also the only sustained climbing: roughly 1.9 kilometres of switchbacks with the runs and lift towers on one side.
Watch for the BP markers nailed to trees. They are the reliable navigation on this trail and they matter more than the signage, which is intermittent.
At the junction near the top of the climb the Black Mountain loop breaks off and the character changes completely. You come out onto the plateau and the ground turns to rock slab, heather and water. Cabin Lake is the obvious destination and the one everyone stops at, a shallow lake in a rock basin that genuinely warms up by late July because there is not much of it and the rock around it holds heat.
A 250-metre spur runs to the northern viewpoint above Yew Lake, which is where you get the Lions and the look north-west toward Bowen Island and the Sunshine Coast. Take it. Note that dogs are not permitted on the Yew Lake trail itself when it is snow free, which is a separate trail from this viewpoint spur but confuses people every summer.
From Cabin Lake it is about ten minutes to the southern summit, which is the higher of the two and gives you the city view. The loop then returns via the Baden-Powell Trail and drops you back at the lots.
Which direction to walk it
Both work and the difference is real. Going up the steep Baden-Powell first and coming down the gentler side means you do all the hard climbing in the first forty minutes, in forest, in the shade. That is the version I would default to.
The argument for the other direction is photographic. If you want the southern summit at blue hour, you want to arrive there last, and that means running the loop so the descent is on ground you have already walked in daylight.
Cabin Lake, and the swimming question
Cabin Lake is the reason a lot of people come here in August, and it deserves the reputation with one caveat: it is shallow and it is small, so in a dry year by late August it drops noticeably and the margins go muddy. Late July into mid-August is the window where it is both full and warm. It is not a Coast Mountain glacial lake and it is not trying to be.
There is no camping anywhere in this part of the park, so this is a day objective.
Winter
Black Mountain is one of the three maintained backcountry winter trails at Cypress, along with Bowen Lookout and the Yew Lake area, and it makes a good intermediate snowshoe. It is a step up from Bowen Lookout: more sustained climbing, more elevation, and a plateau that is genuinely confusing in flat light because every direction looks the same and the tarns are invisible under snow.
From November 1 to May 31 you need a free backcountry access corridor tag to cross the resort's terrain to reach the trail. They come from the self-registration area in the Black Mountain Lodge, they cost nothing, and they are checked at the gate. Get it before you put your snowshoes on.
The avalanche picture on the Black Mountain trail itself is more moderate than the Howe Sound Crest Trail north of Bowen Lookout, but "more moderate" is not "none": there is enough steep, open terrain on and around the plateau to matter, and the trail west toward Eagle Bluffs crosses ground that BC Parks explicitly discourages winter travel on. Check the Avalanche Canada North Shore forecast at avalanche.ca before you go, and treat the summit plateau as your endpoint rather than a place to continue from.
Practical notes
Cypress requires no BC Parks day-use pass. For 2026 the passes are Joffre Lakes, Garibaldi and Golden Ears in summer and Mount Seymour in winter. Cypress is on neither list, and the free BAC tag in winter is a separate thing entirely from a day pass.
Dogs are welcome and must be leashed. Keep them off the Yew Lake trail when it is snow free.
Parking is free in all lots in summer. In winter, expect competition from the ski crowd and check whether pay parking is in effect, because BC Parks says the resort may implement it outside the free designated areas between November and May.
Drones are prohibited in BC Parks without permission, which is rarely granted.
Trail notes from the field
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Shooting this trail
Photography notes
- Best light
- This is a two-window mountain, which is unusual and worth planning around. The northern viewpoint above Yew Lake looks toward the Lions and works best in late afternoon when the Lions are side-lit and the north face has shape rather than being a flat grey wall. The southern summit looks over Vancouver and the Strait and is a sunset and blue-hour position. You can shoot both in one evening if you move between them in the last hour, which is roughly a ten-minute walk. Midday on this plateau is the worst light anywhere at Cypress: the granite goes white and the tarns lose all reflection.
- Best season
- Late July and August for the tarns at full reflection and Cabin Lake warm enough to swim, September for clean air and low crowds, and February for a snow-covered plateau where the frozen tarns become white voids in the composition.
- Compositions
- Cabin Lake as a mirror at 24-35mm. The lake sits in a shallow rock basin with the summit rocks behind it. On a still morning it reflects cleanly, and because it is shallow the water reads as a warm brown-green rather than blue, which contrasts nicely with the grey rock. Get low. Waist height kills this shot.
- The Lions from the northern viewpoint at 70-135mm. This is the frame worth carrying the long lens for. From the north end of the plateau the West and East Lion sit above the intervening ridge, and compression makes them fill the frame properly rather than being two small bumps on a horizon.
- The tarn scatter at 16-24mm. There are several small nameless pools across the plateau and the composition that works is a low wide angle with one pool as a hard foreground, the heather and stunted hemlock as a middle band, and a peak on the horizon. This is the shot that looks like nowhere else on the North Shore.
- The southern summit at blue hour, 24-50mm. The city and the Strait spread out south with the ridge dropping away below you. About thirty minutes after sunset the streetlights and the remaining sky are within a stop of each other. Walk back in the dark on a trail you have already covered, which is why doing this loop clockwise and finishing at the south summit is the right order.
- Gear
- A polariser matters more here than on most local hikes because the whole subject is water and wet granite, and you will want to control the reflections rather than take whatever you get. Carry a tripod if you plan the blue-hour version. The plateau is exposed and the wind moves across it, so a lightweight tripod with nothing to hang off it will vibrate through a long exposure. Bug pressure around the tarns in early July is real: repellent, not a head net, is usually enough.
From the trail
