Hike Amisk Wuche Trail, Elk Island National Park

35 minutes east of Edmonton (or one hour from the Edmonton International airport) is Elk Island National Park, a diverse northern prairie ecosystem with grassland, aspen and boreal forest that is home to a variety of mammals and over 250 bird species.

The Amisk Wuche (Cree for “Beaver Hills”) Trail showcases the diversity of the park winding through aspen, birch and spruce forests, marsh and takes you across small kettle lakes and beaver ponds with floating boardwalks. It is an easy-moderate, looped trail (that has a few small, hilly sections) at just 2.7 kilometers in length taking about an hour to hike.

During the summer, the trail is full of lush greenery and flowers. The marshes and ponds are home to frogs, beavers, muskrat and amphibian, aquatic and avian life. Don’t forget to bring bug spray in the summer months, there are a lot of mosquitos.

Getting there: Coming from Edmonton on Highway 16 turn into Elk Island National Park (the south end of the park, heading north), drive approximately 14 km past the park gate. The Amisk Wuche trailhead and parking lot is on the east side of the road just past Astotin Lake. It’s GPS coordinates are: Lat.: 53.678683 Long.: -112.822728