Bear Glacier Park is a BC Parks site on Highway 37A between Meziadin Junction and Stewart. BC Parks describes Bear Glacier as a destination for travellers heading north on Highway 37 and a short side trip toward Stewart.
The glacier descends toward Strohn Lake down Bear River Pass.
Bear Glacier Park is best understood as a dramatic glacier-viewing stop along the Stewart approach rather than a developed activity park. The official page does not list camping, trails, beach facilities, or a long activity menu. Its value is the roadside landscape story of glacier, lake, pass, and retreat.
BC Parks says ice once filled all of Bear River Pass. In the 1940s, Bear Glacier began to retreat and Strohn Lake formed in the exposed basin. At first, the glacier acted as an ice dam and prevented the lake from draining down the Bear River Valley.
Between 1958 and 1962, Strohn Lake emptied underneath its ice dam five times in catastrophic floods of muddy water, rock, and ice. BC Parks identifies this type of flood by the Icelandic term jokulhlaup. In 1967, the glacier melted away from the valley wall and the lake was no longer dammed.
Plan around glacier viewing, Strohn Lake scenery, Bear River Pass photography, Highway 37A road-trip stops, glacier-retreat interpretation, and learning about the park's 1998 Class A provincial park designation.
Treat Bear Glacier as a viewpoint-style stop with mountain highway conditions. Confirm Highway 37A status, weather, pullout safety, avalanche or winter conditions, photography stops, and BC Parks updates before travelling.
