Travels with Joe

Fri. 22 - Wed. 27 October: Travels with Joe

This week my godson Joe, 16, has been visiting from England. This gave me the perfect chance to show him some of my favorite corners of the Alberta foothills and mountains. We wasted no time getting out there, despite the often wintry weather.

Friday 22nd: Elbow River Valley

Starting close to home, we explored the Elbow River valley, along with his mom (and my “oldest” friend) S. We enjoyed the reflections of Forgetmenot Pond, the swirling waters of Elbow Falls, and then a short stroll part way up the Fullerton Loop Trail to the first viewpoint.

It was mostly overcast but not particularly cold. There were some skiffs of snow in places, and more on the mountainsides, but no heavy snowfall warnings in the forecast – yet. On the way back we enjoyed an unseasonal ice cream in the village of Bragg Creek.

Statistics
Fullerton Loop
Fri. 22 October

Total Dist. 4.0 km (hike)
Height Gain 300 ft.
Max. Elev. 4900 ft.
Time on trail 1 hr. 10 mins.

Saturday 23rd: Banff and Lake Louise

Next day Joe and I headed west to Banff National Park. Here we took the gondola to the top of Sulphur Mountain and then strolled up the boardwalks to the observatory on Sanson Peak. Being a partly sunny Saturday, it was quite busy with tourists. After a burger at Bruno’s in Banff we turned westwards to Lake Louise. We drove up to the Lake Louise ski hill, and stood on the balcony of the Lodge, looking across to the front slopes. There were just a few patches of man-made snow. Yet the season will probably be in full swing by mid-November.

At Lake Louise itself, the lakeside was of course busy with sightseers, even a wedding party. The lake seemed to be colorless today, but as we climbed the switchback path, looking down we could see that wonderful duck-egg blue color of the water from above. It looked unreal, almost as if it was filled with blue PowerAid, we thought.

There was a steady procession of people coming back down the path: people of all ages, in assorted clothing, some more suitable for a high street, but everyone happy to exchange a cheery “hello” as we passed.

Mirror Lake was frozen over, but the path up to Lake Agnes only had a trace of snow on it. So Joe was not able yet to try out his new MicroSpikes, care of Mountain Equipment Co-op in Calgary.

Lake Agnes was also frozen over, and people were wandering about on the ice, some with skates on and hockey sticks. The ice looked a little thin to me, but nobody fell through so it must have been safe enough. We returned down the steps and along the pretty trail to Mirror Lake and then down to Lake Louise, detouring through the lobby of the Chateau to warm up a bit. It was dark by the time we reached Canmore. It had been a full day.

Statistics
Sulphur Mtn. Summit
Sat. 23 October

Total Dist. 1.0 km (hike)
Height Gain 184 ft.
Max. Elev. 7667 ft.
Time on trail 0 hrs. 38 mins.


Statistics
Lake Agnes
Sat. 23 October

Total Dist. 8.0 km (hike)
Height Gain 1300 ft.
Max. Elev. 7000 ft.
Time on trail 2 hrs. 28 mins.


Monday 25th: Upper Kananaskis Lake

Off to the Kananaskis Lakes – despite a wintry look to Calgary this morning. A thin cover of new snow had fallen and it was spitting snow. But we ignored this and happily jumped into the car for the journey west along the Trans-Canada Highway and then south down the Kananaskis Valley. Clouds hung around the mountains, and there was new snow on the front ranges.

We stopped at Canoe Meadows and the Widow-maker to see if anyone was on the river – there was nobody there. Today was a colder day, with a promise of snow showers. Arriving at the Interlakes parking area between the Lower and Upper Kanananskis Lakes, we bundled up well, before setting off along the north side of the Upper Lake. There were no other cars parked here, and we did not expect to find anyone on the trail – and there were none. Sadly there were no large moose or elk or bear to be seen either. A year ago I had seen a huge moose at close range, but not today.

We hiked along the upper trail before dropping down across the boulder field and down to the western edge of the lake. Soon we were within the sound of the Upper Kananaskis Falls, which tumble down into the Upper Lake, with the high cliffs of Mt. Lyautey half hidden in the mist above. Here we stopped for a picnic at a convenient bench, before returning down the trail.

I thought Joe might like to have a look around a typical Canadian backcountry campsite, so we wandered through the Point campsite. There were huge piles of newly chopped logs, and even a large axe left for the use of campers. We thought that the two new, circular green loos might have been time machines in disguise. But opening the door, one sniff told us that they certainly were not. Campsite #20 would be my choice for the perfect campsite award, and I will return one day soon to stay there for a night or two.

Joe is a strong hiker and so it didn’t take us long to stride back up the boulder field, and along the lower route through the forest by the lake, back to our car.

We were not finished yet. I was curious to see the new footbridge that had just been installed at Sarrail Creek. So we drove to the eastern end of the Upper Lake, and strolled the 1.2 km around the edge of the lake to the creek. It was a nice bridge, but when I was here a year ago, the old one looked strong enough. Perhaps it had been damaged by a falling tree? Anyway, we stopped to admire the tumbling waterfall before returning back along the trail. There had been some isolated sunny breaks, but it had generally been overcast and quite cold, with a westerly breeze. So we were glad to climb back into a warm car.

Our return journey took us over the Highwood Pass, where the wind was blowing snow across the road, and then down the Highwood Valley. There were a few cars parked here and there – horse riders, hunters, and a few hikers – perhaps surprising for a Monday in late October. In the Cat Creek picnic area was a covered wagon – I had heard that you may come across these on the trails west of the Highwood, but had never seen one before. There were a few trailers parked in the Strawberry winter campsite – probably hunters. As we drove east we left the patches of sunshine behind us and entered a cloudy, overcast landscape. We were soon back in Calgary.


Statistics
Upper Kananaskis Falls
Mon. 25 October

Total Dist. 9.0 km (hike)
Height Gain 160 ft.
Max. Elev. 5800 ft.
Time on trail 2 hrs. 57 mins.

Statistics
Mt. Sarrail Creek Bridge
Mon. 25 October

Total Dist. 2.4 km (hike)
Height Gain 0 ft.
Max. Elev. 5700 ft.
Time on trail 0 hrs. 36 mins.

Wednesday 27th: Sheep River Valley

A cold, foggy morning in Calgary didn’t deter us from confidently heading out on our next adventure – which turned out to be a very good decision.

Driving south out of Calgary I tried to point out my office, half enveloped in fog. After finding a way across the blocked railway line in Okotoks, we turned west towards Big Rock. Here it was several degrees below freezing, there was a fog, and the snow and ice covered the interpretive sign. But we walked around the glacial “erratic” and had fun imagining how this huge rock made its way down from the distant mountains – was it carried by the glacier, or did it chase a Blackfoot Indian across the prairie, or perhaps was it carried by The Flood? All options I have heard!

Continuing west, we passed through Turner Valley and up onto the Sheep River road.

We were in for a big surprise. Suddenly the fog dissipated, and we entered a sunny mountain world. If we had been in an aircraft, the prairie would have appeared as a sea of fog. Up here it was perhaps around freezing or a degree or two above, but the atmosphere was clear and the mountains stood out sharply along the western skyline.

Driving to the far western end of the Sheep Valley, we saw a group of horses being readied for a back-country expedition, and a guy preparing to offload a quad vehicle perhaps to go hunting up the Sheep River. We dropped our bikes off at the Indian Oils picnic area, then returned a little way east to Gorge Creek. My bear warning sign was still taped to the Indian Oils trail sign, over five weeks after I had put it there. I removed it.

Our first task was to cross an active Sheep River. Using our plastic bag technique we were mostly successful, except for a slightly wet sock which we quickly replaced. The Teskey Road trail is not marked on any maps but I knew where to find it. We picked up this old logging road by pushing our way to the back of the forested meadow on the other side of the river. After a straightforward ascent up a slightly clogged trail, we reached the Sheep River gorge and swung south through pleasant meadows into the forest. Joining the Sheep Valley trail, we continued along a wide, muddy trail, but it was frozen enough to allow us to stay dry. Dropping down to Dyson Falls, we sat by the Dyson Creek and enjoyed the sausage rolls which L had bought for us.

The next leg of the journey was familiar territory to me, as we strode along the Sheep Trail in a westerly direction. High above us to the left, on a distant ridge, we could see the Junction fire lookout – now closed up for the winter. The sun shone out of a mostly clear sky, although we could see some clouds bubbling up just over the mountain tops. In summer this might mean afternoon rain, but today they did not threaten.

The gradual descent through the forest brought us to the Indian Oils bridge and Tiger Jaw Falls. Back at our bikes, we relaxed in the sun, before speeding eastwards down the road. On the way, we stopped to walk across the meadow to the edge of the spectacular river gorge – a dangerous spot to stand. One final whiz down a steep hill and we were back at the car.

Reluctantly we returned to the foggy, cold world of the prairies, as the perfect Fall day was swallowed up in an icy mist.

Statistics
Teskey Road to Indian Oils
Wed. 27 October

Total Dist. 8.5 km (hike) + 4.7 km (bike) = 13.2 km
Height Gain 600 ft.
Max. Elev. 5410 ft.
Time on trail 3 hrs. 10 mins.

Late Season Hikes in the Canadian Rockies

Sat. 16 October: Little Beehive Lookout => Hector Lake

Another fire lookout to add to my 2010 haul. And then a visit to a rarely visited but spectacular Rocky Mountain lake – all in one day.

Every trip at this time of year is an added bonus to the hiking season. A year ago I had faced deep snow and temperatures way below zero. This weekend called for endless sunshine, but cool. So of course I couldn’t wait to leave the city and head out to Banff National Park in the mid-afternoon.

The day had started differently. It had snowed a couple of inches in Calgary during the morning, and the skies were still overcast as I left the city. But it was starting to clear up, and the further west I drove, the better the weather became.

The road-works west of Castle Junction were proceeding at full pace – it looked as if they were trying to get a lot of it finished before winter, and that they knew they were already on borrowed time. The Jasper/Icefields junction was particularly frantic with paving crews.

Mosquito Creek campsite, about 30 km north from Lake Louise, is open all year. It is a grand setting, in the Bow River valley along the Icefields Parkway. It surprised me to find that it was high enough here that the site was covered by two inches of new snow.

There were a handful of other campers here. Interesting that there were no large RVs, just – it seemed – younger couples towing small trailers, or sleeping in the backs of their cars. Then there was the author with his tiny tent.

I scraped the ground clear of snow with my boots, then quickly had the tent up, and the picnic table scraped off.

Before lighting the fire and settling down to supper, I drove back down the road, map in hand, to try to figure out the trailhead for Hector Lake. I thought I had it right – I was wrong.

It was a cold evening, with clearing skies. A half moon rose in the sky and the stars came out. I was early to bed. This time, my sleeping bag didn’t feel too warm. The extra blankets kept me warm, as long as I kept my nose under the covers. Some time in the middle of the night, a young couple quietly moved in to the campsite next to mine and erected a tent – safety in numbers I suppose.

Saturday morning was cold. There was a good covering of frost on my tent and on the car. My plan today was to drive back down to Lake Louise to hike up to the Little Beehive lookout, then to return north to explore Hector Lake.

Little Beehive is one of the most popular hikes in the Lake Louise area, and so I expected to share my travels with weekend tourists. In the end, there were not really many people on the upper pathways. What a start to a hike – the beautiful gardens of the Chateau Lake Louise, with the breathtaking lake to my left, as I strolled past the early tourists enjoying the cool morning air.

To reach the Little Beehive one takes the well-graded trail to Lake Agnes, high above Lake Louise. It was this trail which L and I first took our two girls in backpacks in the 1980’s. I made good progress and was soon at Mirror Lake. A little further up the snow-covered trail, I turned right and followed the path up to the Little Beehive summit. Of course the views of the mountain scenery were superb. Lake Louise always lives up to its reputation as a world-class destination.

The summit of Little Beehive is a flat, forested ridge, and on the end of the ridge is a square concrete foundation, the remains of the fire lookout. It seemed quite tiny, but it would have supported a comfy lookout building, before it was removed in the 1980’s. There are grand views of the Bow River Valley, but one can only just see the front end of Lake Louise and the Chateau, far below. Mt. Fairview and mighty Mt. Temple (11,624 ft.), and the soaring cliffs of Big Beehive, dominate the views. The good thing about this trip is that you have options on the return. I turned right and dropped down to Lake Agnes and the teahouse. Sadly the building was boarded up for the winter and the lake was mostly frozen over. I dropped back down to Mirror Lake via a set of steep stairs and a pretty mountain trail.

Back at Lake Louise the day had really started to get going, with crowds of tourists having their pictures taken, and a tour guide giving a talk to a group of attentive guests. Time to leave one crowded lake for another much less frequently visited.

The Bow River flows through Calgary on its long journey across the prairie to Hudsons Bay. The source of the river is the Bow Glacier, just north of my campsite along the Icefields Parkway. Below Bow Glacier sits the spectacular Bow Lake, and from the outlet of the lake, the river runs south towards Lake Louise. This roughly 50 km stretch of river runs through an almost inaccessible and remote valley floor. Hidden below the wall of glacier-capped mountains lies Hector Lake. It is just visible from the Icefields Parkway, but there are no obvious trails to reach it. There is just one viewpoint where tourists can stop to look down to the distant lake. It is the major feeder for the Bow River.

My recce the previous evening had uncovered what I took to be the start of a trail down to the lake, which lay about two kilometers from the highway. Someone had tied a red tape to a bush at a clearing by the road, and there seemed to be a snow-covered trail heading into the thick downward-sloping forest. So I parked my car and set off into the wilderness.

This seemed more to me like a game trail than a well-used path, and it appeared to be heading south, parallel to the hillside instead of downwards to the hidden river. So I decided to make my own path. The next kilometer or so was a crazy bushwhack down through a forest choked by fallen trees and a tangle of bushes. Just to be sure that I could return if I needed, I made a very thorough job of blazing the trail, using half a reel of red tape. Some future explorer will not thank me for the trail I blazed, as it wandered haphazardly down the mountainside.

Eventually I could hear the sound of a river below, and soon reached the edge of the shallow Bow River. Here a vague path followed the riverbank, and using common sense I turned left to follow the river as it wandered in a generally southerly direction through the forest. It was a typically lonely Canadian scene, which in a few weeks will be snow-covered and silent.

After about a kilometer I was relieved to come upon the correct trail leading down from the highway. I had started too far north along the road. A small sign pointed to the Hector Lake campsite, which lay across the river, on the other side of a small forested hill. I continued to head in a southwesterly direction on vague trails, across a wide valley floor consisting of dry riverbeds and a more open forest. In the distance I could now make out the edge of a large lake. A short time later I was standing on the edge of Hector Lake. There is something weird about the scale in this wilderness. What might typically be a kilometer seems about two or three times further down here. I was perhaps only two kilometres from the start of the hike here, but it felt very much further from civilization.

Hector Lake would be as popular as Bow Lake or even Lake Louise if it was more accessible. But I would suspect only a handful of people venture down here in a typical year. The shoreline is made up of either gravel or mud, with a few tree trunks lying on the edge, but generally very open. The glacial blue waters are ringed by the magnificent mountains of the Continental Divide, snow covered, and with glaciers in the high valleys. A biting, cold breeze blew across the lake, which measures about 5.3 km long and 1.2 km across. Soon it will be frozen over. I felt slightly uneasy standing in such a remote place, especially when I discovered an empty beer can on the beach. But then things looked up when I discovered a full can of beer a little further along the beach.

I followed the edge of the lake in an easterly direction, seeking the trail and the river crossing. My first plan had been to cross over the river and then follow the south shoreline to a smaller mountain lake called Margaret Lake – I had been intrigued by the name, and the setting, of this lake. But the southern shoreline was already in shade, and this looked to be much more of an adventure than I was equipped for today. When I finally reached the exit to the lake, across boggy ground, it was clear that the volume and depth of water flowing out of the lake were too much for a simple crossing. And there must have been huge floods in past years which made the whole area a tangled mess of tree trunks and streambeds and watery inlets. So I was happy enough to turn north and pick my way along a dry stream back to the trail junction.

Relieved not to have to retrace my steps up the hillside which I had so carefully blazed, I turned instead onto a good trail. This led me safely back up to the Icefields Parkway, and so back northwards up the road to my car. It was a cool day, perhaps just a few degrees above zero, but it was sunny and the mountain scenery was the best. In fact, I decided to take a short drive northwards beyond the campsite to enjoy the views around Bow Lake. In summer this is a very popular tourist spot, with views of the Bow Glacier. Today one tourist coach was leaving, and I was then alone beside the magnificent, but wintry lake. The sun was shining across the rippling waters, which must surely be frozen over in a few weeks from now.

Back at the camp it was a cold evening. Most of the campers had left during the day, and there were only three other people left, including my tenting neighbors. I walked down through the lightly snow-covered trails to the point where Mosquito Creek joins a young Bow River. It’s a great place for some classic Canadian Rocky Mountain snapshots. Getting a good fire going, I stayed warm, but was in bed early. The temperatures continued to drop overnight. My guess is that it was close to minus ten degrees C by dawn. The skies were filled with stars, with Orion and the Plough being prominent. The half-moon was bright in the sky. But it was too cold to hang around, so shortly before dawn, I was up and it didn’t take me long to pack away the tent and jump into the car. It took a bit longer for the heater to make headway on the frosty windscreen. Driving back east I turned onto the quiet Highway 1A and stopped for an impromptu breakfast in the car (a version of a “walk in the car”?).

From here it was a leisurely return to Calgary along roads which were only just starting to get busy with day-trippers out for a last trip to the mountains before the winter snows start to fall.


Statistics
Little Beehive
Sat. 16 October

Total Dist. 9.0 km (hike)
Height Gain 1675 ft.
Max. Elev. 7350 ft.
Time on trail 2 hrs. 19 mins.


Statistics
Hector Lake
Sat. 16 October

Total Dist. 5.0 km (hike)
Height Loss/Gain -/+ 200 ft.
Lake Elev. 5906 ft.
Time on trail 2 hrs. 31 mins.

Above the Lakes of Kananaskis Country

Fri. 8 October: Upper Kananaskis River Viewpoint

I don’t go all the way down to the Kananaskis Lakes often enough. After this Thanksgiving weekend the last of the campsites close down. So this was my last chance this year to spend a couple of days hiking around the heart of Kananaskis Country.

Interlakes campsite stretches along the forested shoreline of the Lower Kananaskis Lake, and as the name suggests, the Upper Lake is just over the hill. This is a fine camping area, and I had plenty of ideal sites to choose from. By the time that dark descended, I had a fire going and was enjoying my usual gourmet dinner - some chunky chicken soup out of a can followed by a marmalade sandwich (more marmalade than bread).

There was a breeze during the night, and I could hear the water lapping along the shoreline just a few yards from my tent.

My plan for Friday was to bike up the short hill to the Upper Lake, then head west above the northern shore to Invincible Creek. From here it would be an unofficial hiking route up to a high viewpoint above the Upper Kananaskis River and Upper Lake.
Not far west of the penstock, where the trail started to climb, I hid my bike in the trees and continued on foot. The north side of the Upper Lake gives fine views across to the Continental Divide across the lake. Today some low lying clouds were trapped in the pass below the Elk Range, and overhead it was a mixture of sun and cloud. The trail crosses several impressive rock slides, and sooner or later there will be another one – hopefully when I’m not on the trail.

A sturdy little footbridge crosses Invincible Creek. Immediately after crossing this bridge I turned right off the main trail and followed the edge of the stream to an abandoned fire road. This road steadily climbed the mountainside, making good hiking, apart from all the deadfall across the trail. But having negotiated Mt. Daer fire road, this was no problem. In the latest version of Gillean Daffern’s guidebook, she suggested that a seniors hiking club was planning to clear the trail. No sign of that yet.

After a kilometer and a bit, the fire road ended and I was facing a murderously steep cutline, which had apparently been created as a firebreak during a previous fire. I just put my head down and kept plodding upwards until the grade finally relented. Here in an overgrown meadow, the guidebook told hikers to find a cairn indicating the start of a trail into the forest. The cairn was just a low pile of stones, and the trail was barely discernable. In fact, I decided to make good use of my red blaze tape. This turned out to be a good decision, as on the return journey I would have been lost a dozen times. This so-called trail, marked by about two bits of old blaze and a few piles of stone, made its way along the mountainside in thick forest, just below the open scree slopes above.

Finally I came to a tiny clearing, at the far end of which a dry streambed rose up the hillside. Following this streambed, I eventually came up onto a high point between the huge mountainside to my right and my destination ridge to the left.

I first climbed up the hillside too early and found myself looking west across a shallow valley to my correct ridge. So I headed back down to the col and then swung south and up the forested ridge to a superb viewpoint. A cairn marked the summit, which was surrounded by the grandest of mountain peaks, many snow covered, and some with glaciers.

I could follow the Upper Kananaskis River valley northwards to distant glaciers and mountain peaks with cloud pouring over them. Directly to my west was 9,646 ft. Mt. Putnick, and my southern horizon was filled by the huge Mt. Lyautey, 9,990ft. Far below me to the east was the Upper Kananaskis Lake. This is one view of the vastly popular lake that not many people will ever get, unless they are prepared to expend quite a bit of energy.

Returning back down to lake level, I was glad of all my new blazing through the upper forest, and I hope other travelers may also thank this unknown hiker for all this red tape.

I stopped for a picnic at my favorite park bench, at the junction with the trail to Point backcountry campsite. This is a good place for a birds eye view of the lake and of the twisting path that leads through the desolate rockfall landscape to the western end of the lake. Returning down the trail I met my first humans, a young couple with their younger children and older parents, all having a grand time except for one child who was running along the trail crying her eyes out. Picking up my bike I was soon back at the campsite.

I relaxed by the edge of the lake for a while. Later, a pink glow spread over the water and in the clouds above the mountains, as the light faded. A few more people had arrived at the campsite during the evening, but it was perhaps only about one third full. Many people had declared camping season over by now, and so it was perhaps only the warm weather which had encouraged this many people out into the mountains this long weekend.

Statistics
Upper Kananaskis River Viewpoint
Fri. 8 October

Total Dist. 12.8 km (hike) + 4.2 km (bike) = 17.0 km
Height Gain 1720 ft.
Max. Elev. 7300 ft.
Time on trail 6 hrs. 11 mins.


Sat. 9 October: Frozen Lake

This lake got its name for a reason. It’s usually only ice-free for about three months each year. Frozen Lake is cradled in the arms of Mt. Fox, held in by a steep headwall. What a find it must have been when some early explorer first stumbled upon it. Looking west to the mountain wall, you would never guess that it hid such a spectacular lake.

The approach to Frozen Lake took me on familiar trails, but ones which I had only previously traveled on skis in winter. I arrived at the Elk Pass trailhead, just down the road from my campsite, soon after sunrise. The first part of the trail rises steeply to the power-line summit, before dropping down into Fox Creek. This lower portion of Fox Creek was wet and muddy, which puzzled me, given the recent dry weather. But then I remembered seeing the cloud from my lookout trail yesterday, and I guess that it might have been raining here under that cloud. Also, it seemed that there had been a lot of truck traffic along this power-line access road, and this had churned up the surface.

But soon I was traveling along the gentle Fox Creek on a drier trail up the winding valley. The ski trail signs have all been removed and I suppose they put them back up again quite soon. Nevertheless I recognized the Blueberry Hill trail junction with its picnic table. Just a few hundred yards further on, I came to the West Elk Pass junction. Leaving my bike behind some trees, I turned right off the main trail, and before long I found myself on the Alberta-British Columbia border.

This is called West Elk Pass, but it is an almost imperceptible high point in a wide, flat valley. An information board and lots of good signposts directed me westwards along a cut-line directly headed for the mountain wall. Almost immediately, the trail down into BC and the Elk Lakes turned off to the left, while I continued straight on. Crossing a broad, damp meadow, the trail made one short, steep climb, and then a longer and steeper ascent, to an old boundary marker post. This dilapidated concrete post, covered by a zinc lining, was erected way back in 1916 by surveyors marking the Alberta-BC border.

From here, the trail rose steeply up the mountainside, before cutting diagonally across the steep forested headwall to the edge of the lake. Under sunny skies, it is probably a dark blue color, but today under a mostly cloudy sky, it was a deep green. The front side of the lake is a pleasant strip of trees, including many larches, now past their best. Steep, bare mountain slopes ring the lake on all other sides. The remains of a glacier sit directly behind the lake.

As I sat above the waters, admiring this grand setting, some mist rose up from the floor of the Elk Valley and drifted into the mountain bowl, before dissipating up the mountainside. The guide book suggests that you can scramble up to a grand viewpoint to the left of the lake, called “Taiga Viewpoint”. I did give some thought to clambering up there, but in the end decided that I would give it a miss. It didn’t look too impossible, but it was a bit more than I felt like doing today. In any event, my perch above the lake was spectacular enough.

I dropped back down the steep slopes and onto the cut-line. It didn’t take me long to return to the trailhead where I recovered my bike. Here I met two elderly couples heading for Frozen Lake. “Oh, WE should have brought our bikes, too”, exclaimed one of their party. And so they should. For my return journey back down to the car was an enjoyable coast along Fox Creek, with minimal effort. After the short hill back up to the power-line, it was one frantic breakneck ride back to the car. Halfway down the hill I flew past a group of young people idling up the hillside, one of them clutching what looked like a 12-pack of beer. I had completed my journey just in time to avoid the busy afternoon trails.

Returning to the warm and sunny campsite, I stopped to enjoy the perfect lakeside setting. Packing up, I was soon on my way back home. The journey over the Highwood Pass and down to Longview was leisurely as I was enjoying the clear atmosphere and recognizing all my hiking routes of the past year. It wasn’t as busy as the previous weekend, but judging from the number of parked cars, there were plenty of people out enjoying the long weekend. A sports car roared past me, but I soon caught up with them as they had been stopped by a police car hiding along the Highwood Valley.

I was glad to arrive back in town for a hot shower, and to enjoy the rest of the Thanksgiving Holiday at home.

Statistics
Frozen Lake
Sat. 9 October

Total Dist. 5.0 km (hike) + 9.8 km (bike) = 14.8 km
Height Gain 1620 ft.
Max. Elev. 7170 ft.
Time on trail 3 hrs. 47 mins.

Cameron Lookout revisited (25 years later!)

Sat. 2 October: Mt. Burke - Cameron Lookout

Ironically, now that October had arrived, I was rewarded with one of the best weather days of the year for this steep hike up 8,330ft. Mt. Burke.

It was a quarter century ago, in July 1985, that the author, then 34 years old, first climbed this mountain. On a related note, I remember as a teenager on an early hike in Scotland seeing grizzled old Glaswegians out on the hills and being told that they would walk you off your young feet any day of the week. I thought – well, if I can still go hiking in the hills when I am as old as sixty, then I will feel as if I have accomplished something in life. I only have 8 months to go until that particular milestone and I am pleased to say that I found this hike up Mt. Burke no harder than the first attempt back in 1985.

Anyway, back to today’s story!

Deciding to camp out, I left the city on Friday afternoon, heading south and west into the Highwood. Only a few campsites are still open at this time of year and so I turned south onto the gravel forestry road at Highwood Junction, and was soon at Etherington Creek. The campsite was empty except for two sites, and so I picked the same spot I had stayed in last year, above the tiny creek, which runs around the perimeter of the campsite. As far as I know, not one other person arrived during the evening, and I never even saw the person who ran the campsite. Although it was a clear evening it was quite cold, and so I was glad of a warm fire and then my comfy sleeping bag. I slept well.

The following morning it was still dark at 7.30 a.m. but soon the light started to filter through the trees. It was a short drive down the forestry road to Cataract Creek, the start of my trip today. The campsite at Cataract Creek was closed, so I parked in a large picnic area across the road, and biked up the campsite road and across the Salter Creek bridge.

In earlier days, the trail to Cameron Lookout used to follow a fire road on the south side of the creek. In 1997 there was a devastating flash flood, and it washed away the road. So now the trail wanders eastwards along the north side of Salter Creek. You can actually then stay on the north bank or cross over to the south side. Both paths lead to the same place. I chose the latter. After a few hundred meters I crossed back over to the north side of the almost dry creek, and headed up a side creek into the lower folds of Mt. Burke. This side creek was totally dry, although there were signs of earlier floods.

After a short stroll up this narrow-sided valley I came to the important junction for Cameron Lookout Trail. On my last visit here in 1985, there was a sign pointing to the lookout. Now instead there was a strange combination of cairn and poles and bent tree branches, to point hikers in the right direction.

After a steep scramble up the bank, the trail settled down into a long series of nicely-graded switch-backs up the steep forested slopes. I took my time climbing the path. Reading my diary from my first ascent I see that I apparently raced up the lower slopes, but then paid for it higher up when I started to run out of breath. Being older and wiser I now adopted the slow-but-steady approach. This trail reminded me a lot of the lower section of Sunset Trail in northern Banff Park. On my return down the trail I counted the zig-zags and found that there were 33 of them up to the tree-line – just a few less than on the Sunset Trail.

Eventually I pulled myself up above the trees, my leg muscles starting to ache a bit from the relentless uphill slopes. I could see signs of horse riders having used this trail. It would have been a tricky ascent for a horse. Now on open slopes, the trail continued to zig-zag upwards to the lower ridge. Immediately the views to the west were spectacular. Surprisingly all the snow from August and September had melted and there was no snow at all on the trail, even above 8000 feet.

Once on the lower ridge, the bare, rocky summit came into sight, with the lookout building perched right on the top. To reach it, one has to cross a narrow but safe section of ridge – safe that is unless there is a strong wind blowing. Today there was a light breeze so it was no problem at all. Finally I reached the top, not feeling particularly worn out.

The lookout building is in rough shape and I am surprised it is still standing after all these years. Here a strong westerly wind was blowing, making an eerie howling sound as it passed through the open glass-less windows of the building. One shutter rattled in the wind. The atmosphere was not perfectly clear to the east, but the views all round were fine. The city of Calgary could be seen in the haze to the northeast. Directly below the lookout on the ridge top was a modular building with aeriels, which looked to be a new addition to the summit. It had a remote camera so I gave a friendly wave to the viewers who might have been watching me from a comfy office somewhere in Calgary I suppose.

It was a pleasant return down the mountainside and back into the forest and the thirty three switchbacks down to the valley floor. Near the bottom I met my only other humans, two young couples heading up the trail. They seemed to be making slightly heavy work of it, but they had plenty of daylight left.

Before returning to the car, I biked through the closed Cataract Creek campsite, and into the meadows beside Cataract Creek. This is one of my favorite places to relax, beside the river, under a warm sunshine. To the east I could look across to the high mountainsides of Mt. Burke, and as usual wondered how I had ever managed to make it all the way up there.

Returning to Etherington Creek I quickly packed up my tent and set off back home. Given the perfect weather today, the roads were as busy as I have seen them all year – and about 50% of traffic consisted of motorbikes. It was an ideal day for a bike trip over the Highwood Pass, and there were plenty of people doing it.

Once again I dropped into the Turner Valley store to do my part in making them profitable! And so home.


Statistics
Mt. Burke - Cameron Lookout
Sat. 2 October

Total Dist. 16.0 km (hike) + 3.0 km (bike) = 19.0 km
Height Gain 2885 ft.
Max. Elev. 8330 ft.
Time on trail 5 hrs. 25 mins.

Around the mountains of Banff

Sat. 25 September: Circuits of Mt. Rundle and Sulphur Mountain[continuation from Tent Ridge/Tryst Lake blog]

All night the wind roared through the tree-tops, swirling through my Tunnel Mountain campsite in Banff, buffeting the tent. The bright moonlight reflected the dancing pine branches on the inside of the tent. This wind blew all day, often with violent gusts. But it was a warm wind, and welcoming to a biker wanting to travel eastwards from Banff to Canmore, as I will relate.

Today was quite a marathon. In one busy day, I made a 48 km circuit of Mt. Rundle, and then a trip over and around Sulphur Mountain. Along with the shapely Cascade Mountain, Rundle and Sulphur are perhaps the best known mountains in the immediate vicinity of Banff townsite.

Rundle is actually a long range of high ridges running along the south side of the Bow River valley between Canmore and Banff. Its most famous profile is seen from a position due north of Banff, where its razor-sharp ridgeline soars above the Banff Springs Hotel. My plan today involved some complex logistics. I would start above Canmore, using my mountain bike to travel down Goat Creek to the Spray River and so into Banff. Changing to my road bike, I would then bike all the way back to Canmore beside the Trans-Canada Highway on the new “Legacy Trail” bike path.

The one tricky bit was to figure out how to get from Canmore up to the start of the Goat Creek Trail, without having to slog over a thousand vertical feet up a gravel road from the town below. Good research had revealed that there is just one taxi company in Canmore that will take you up there for a fee, and this worked perfectly.

The red sky over the Bow Valley was breathtaking as I drove east from Banff to Canmore early Saturday morning. Having dropped off my bike up at Goat Creek, I returned down the hill and parked at a handy hotel, the Rocky Mountain Canmore Inn. My Cougar Creek taxi driver arrived within five minutes and we had a great chat about the local trails as he drove me back up the rough gravel road.

It would probably be a rare day – especially a warm sunny Saturday - for a person to bike the Goat Creek trail and never encounter another person. I achieved this today. This is almost the perfect trail for amateur mountain bikers, since it is downhill all the way. Of course, nothing is that perfect, and there were a few uphill sections along the 19 km route, but it was a fun ride down a steep-sided mountain valley.

There were a few small bridges along the way, with pretty streams or rivers running under them. The occasional splash of autumn color from some of the trees added a beauty to what might otherwise be a green corridor.

I was soon crossing the Spray River, and onto a better forestry road, making very good time the whole way. Reaching the second Spray River junction – which I had visited this time last year - I kept on the west side of the valley, below Sulphur Mountain. I was almost at the Banff Springs Hotel when I met a long string of horses carrying an assorted collection of tourists. I dismounted and politely let then amble past, before continuing on into Banff.

The town was alive today, with what I later learned were 4,500 runners competing in the annual Melissa's road race. Thousands more people were collecting along the roadside, barriers had been erected, a band was playing in front of the museum, and everyone looked to be having a wonderful time. Runners with numbers pinned to their vests were heading down to the pleasure grounds for the start of the race. I negotiated this happy crowd safely, and detoured up onto the Tunnel Mountain road for a long uphill journey through Banff. It was then a pleasant downhill glide past the trailer campsites back to my tent. The 25.5 km journey by bike through the mountain valleys had taken me only two and a quarter hours.

After only a short break at my campsite, I changed bikes and set off down the road to Canmore. With a blustery wind at my back, this was one fast trip. The Legacy Trail bike path was really only just completed yesterday. On my journey west I had noticed the final touches being made to the half dozen bridges and the last sections of paving were being finished off. So I was one of the very first people to travel the length of this brand new trail.

What an improvement from hugging the shoulder of the frantic Trans-Canada Highway. The path follows the highway closely but stays off the shoulder. Thanks to the wind, I was pedaling in the highest gear as fast as my speedy bike would go. There were quite a few people coming in the other direction, struggling against the wind, as I raced past them at lightning speed. As a result, my journey from one end of the trail to the other, ending at the Banff Park gates, took me only 34 minutes, and the whole 22.5 km trip from Banff campsite to my car in Canmore took only sixty four minutes.

Biking time for the 48 km journey from Goat Creek to Canmore town centre, via Banff, was a mere three hours forty two minutes.

But I was far from finished for the day. Back at my campsite in Banff, I changed into my hiking gear and was soon off in the car to the Sulphur Mountain gondola. Sulphur Mountain is a long, high forested ridge which overlooks Banff. Sulphur and Rundle form the two sides of the Spray River valley. The Spray River and the Bow River meet just below the Banff Springs Hotel.
The gondola up Sulphur Mountain is a major Banff tourist attraction, and sure enough it was a busy place this afternoon, especially on such a lovely sunny day. But it didn’t take me long to buy my ticket and there were no line-ups for the cable cars. My plan was simple – to take the easy route to the top of Sulphur Mountain, and then explore the “back side” of the mountain where a fire road would take me back down to the original Banff Hot Springs (called "Cave and Basin") and from there back to the gondola.

A gale was blowing on the mountain top. I joined the crowds of international tourists as they shuffled along the sturdy boardwalks connecting the circular restaurant with the observatory on the summit of Sanson peak. They have gone to a lot of trouble to erect an extensive network of broad wooden steps and viewing areas which was impressive to observe, and nice to walk along. The fierce wind tried to blow everyone off the mountaintop, but the views were spectacular today, with perfect visibility.

This observatory has also, in the past, acted occasionally as a fire lookout, which is why I wanted to visit it this year. It is a tiny stone building which sits right on the highest point of the ridge. There is a glass door so people can look inside. They have recreated the cabin as it once used to be – a bunk bed, table and chair, stove – a minuscule room but actually quite cosy. It would be a better place to have lived than the typical wooden lookout buildings which were (and still are) the usual home for lookouts.

Halfway down the boardwalk I now turned off onto the old fire road for my return journey down the west side of the mountain. I instantly left all the tourists behind me, and passing a middle aged couple, I had the trail to myself from top to bottom of the ridge. This road was in good shape and mostly free from undergrowth at the higher elevations. Lower down, some bushes had grown along the surface, but this was a luxurious descent compared with many of my fire roads this year. The road descends to the Bow Valley in one main diagonal cut down the mountainside – a route plainly visible from the Trans-Canada Highway as one approaches Banff from the west. A few trees in Fall foliage made this a colorful scene, with spectacular mountain views the whole way down.

At the base of the mountain, about 3000 vertical feet below the ridge-top, I joined the paved road leading down from Sundance Canyon to Banff. It is closed to traffic and so was a quiet route along the forested valley floor. This road runs between the northern edge of Sulphur Mountain on the right, and the Bow River on the left. It’s a wonderful place for a stroll. The path leads to the famous Cave and Basin, site of the original Banff hot springs. It closed this July for some major renovations, and won’t be open again until 2012. Quite a long but leisurely stroll took me through the woods back into Banff townsite and up to the Banff Springs Hotel. The town had quietened down a bit from this morning’s bedlam, but it was a lively place with people enjoying the scenery or hurrying to their next shift at one of the hotels.

The final part of my trip took me up the steep forest trails back to the gondola car park. This was the same route I took last year on my way up Sulphur Mountain the hard way. It had been an active day and so I was glad to return to my campsite and relax in front of a fire. All day the wind had been blowing strongly in the treetops, and it was only during the night that it finally died down a bit.

After a good sleep I was on the road early next morning. Today the red sunrise was even more spectacular than the previous morning. Luckily the traffic was light as I snapped away with my camera. I was home shortly after 9 a.m.


Statistics Mt. Rundle Circuit
Sat. 25 September

Total Dist. 48 km (bike)
Height Loss (1100 ft.)
Max. Elev. 5450 ft.
Time on trail 3 hrs. 42 mins.


Statistics Sulphur Mtn. Circuit
Sat. 25 September

Total Dist. 13.5 km (hike)
Height Gain 700 ft.

Height Loss (3000 ft.)
Max. Elev. 7486 ft.
Time on trail 3 hrs. 13 mins.


Statistics - TotalRundle/SulphurSat. 25 September

Total Dist. 13.5 km (hike) + 48.0 km (bike) = 61.5 km
Height Gain 700 ft.
Height Loss (4100 ft.)
Max. Elev. 7486 ft.
Time on trail 6 hrs. 55 mins.