‘It was terrifying’: B.C. hiker describes encounter with cougar on popular trail near Whistler

A popular hiking trail between Squamish and Whistler will be closed this weekend because of aggressive cougar behaviour.

Margaux Cohen is an outdoor content creator from Whistler, B.C., who feels at home in the forest.

“This is all I do, to be honest. When I’m not working, I’m in the mountains,” she said.

On Sunday, June 8, Cohen and her hiking partner Max Stobbe were heading down Rubble Creek Trail after a hike to Garibaldi Lake, between Squamish and Whistler, when they rounded a corner and came face-to-face with a cougar.

“The cougar was right in front of me,” said Cohen. “I’m not even exaggerating when I’m saying this, but it was like two or three feet away from me – so I instantly screamed.”

The pair backed away and made noise to try to scare the cougar off, but it crouched just off the trail and didn’t move for 45 minutes.

“I would not take the risk to pass him. You don’t turn your back on a cougar,” she said. “ I was really surprised that the cougar wasn’t moving.”

Unable to scare the animal away, and with only one route back to the trailhead, Cohen and Stobbe decided to wait at a safe distance with bear spray in hand.

“It was terrifying. My heart was racing,” said Cohen. “My friends and I, we hike places where you will not see anybody for the entire day. So you would never think there would be cougars on that trail that has hundreds of people every day in summertime.”

Eventually, a large group of hikers coming the other way made enough noise to scare the cougar off. But the next day, hikers reported being stalked by two cougars on the same trail. Conservation officers were forced to evacuate several nearby campgrounds and close the trail for a week.

“I think that’s a great call – give the cougars some time to move along without any further confrontation possible with people on the trails,” said Siobhan Darlington, project lead with the Southern B.C. Cougar Project.

She believes the cougar that crouched beside the trail for 45 minutes was simply curious to see humans, but two cougars stalking people is very unusual.

“This could be potentially either a mother and a sub-adult, or two sub-adults together. That’s usually the case where you would see two animals alongside one another,” Darlington said.

Her advice for anyone who encounters cougars in the woods? Make noise and make yourself big.

“Stand your ground. If you see a cougar, don’t turn your back to it. Remain calm and put your arms above your head, put a backpack or something above you to make yourself look big,” said Darlington, who also recommends throwing things at the big cat to scare it off.

While close encounters are scary, she said cougars don’t see people as prey, and attacks are exceedingly rare.

“If that ever does happen, it’s usually an animal that is sick or injured or something – that’s not a healthy cougar doing normal cougar things,” Darlington said.

Darlington hopes by the time the the trail is reopened on Tuesday, June 17, the cougars will have moved on. “They have very large home ranges,” she said. ”They typically won’t stay in one area for very long, not more than a couple of days before they move off.”

Cohen is an avid hiker who frequently sees black bears, but has never caught a glimpse of a cougar. Stobbe managed to shoot 15 seconds of the big cat on his phone, which he posted to TikTok.

While the encounter was frightening, it was a hike the pair will never forget.

“They always see you, but you never see them most of the time,” Cohen said. “So the fact that I got to see one this close and nothing happened to me is great.”