'Miracle' as 20-year-old missing for 50 days in freezing wilderness after going on a ten-day fishing trip is found alive (but complains he didn't catch any fish!)

A missing 20-year-old hiker has been found after he disappeared for over 50 days in the Rockies. 

Sam Benastick was reported missing on October 19 after he did not return from a 10-day fishing and hiking trip in Redfern-Keily Park in the northern Rocky Mountains, in Canada's British Columbia

With temperatures in the mountain region dropping to a bitterly cold -20C, authorities were forced to call off their search in late October.  

But two workers who were heading down a trail on Tuesday spotted Benastick, recognising him as he walked towards them with two walking sticks and a cut-up sleeping bag wrapped around his legs for warmth. 

After being taken to safety, he told cops that he initially stayed in his car for a few days, before walking to a creek near a mountain, where he camped for around two weeks. 

After his time at the creek, he moved further down the valley and built a shelter in a creek bed. 

Announcing his safe return to civilisation, his mother Sandra Crocker told hunters and fishers on a local Facebook group: 'Sam Benastick is alive, it's TRUE. 

'Recovering in hospital. Complained he hadn't caught one fish. He will make recovery, just needs some time.'

Little is known about Sam's condition, but along with the post, Sandra shared a photo of Sam smiling with his thumb up while wearing a medical eyemask. 

Benastick's uncle, Al, said his nephew os an avid outdoorsman who was suffering from 'frostbite and some smoke inhalation' in an interview with CBC News.

It was 'kind of unbelievable' his nephew survived, he said. 'Imagine being out there, being that cold, for that long.'

Mike Reid, the general manager of the inn Sam's family stayed in for nearly three weeks while searching for him told CNN: 'He was in pretty bad shape but he's alive.'

Reid added that he gave the family free meals out of sympathy for their plight. 

'I've got three kids and five grandkids. So I know what they were going through,' he said.

Experts said Sam's survival was nothing short of miraculous.  

'Those are very difficult conditions for really anyone to survive in, especially [with] limited supplies and equipment and food,' Prince George Search and Rescue search manager Adam Hawkins told the BBC.

'Even someone with quite a bit of experience would find that challenging.'

The search, conducted by the Canadian Rangers, the RCMP, and family and friends, saw organisations trawl through 'a pretty huge amount of terrain', Hawkins said.

The area he went missing in is several hours from any towns, and featured difficult terrain including low-lying hills, steep alpine cliffsides, and 'even glaciated terrain', he said.

'Finding Sam alive is the absolute best outcome. After all the time he was missing, it was feared that this was would not be the outcome said Cpl Madonna Saunderson of British Columbia's Royal Canadian Mounted Police force. 

The force added that 'many local volunteers with extensive back country knowledge of the area' provided assistance in their search for him.