2011: Year in Review

2011:  Year in Review

The Passionate Hiker’s “Picture of the Week”

Last year I started my own blog, which I called “The Passionate Hiker”.  Not that anyone ever reads it!  This year I added a feature which provided me with some amusement while out on the trails, keeping an eye out for unusual pictures for my “Picture of the Week”. 

I am in the process of creating a separate photo album to capture these weekly snapshots in one handy book.

This Year’s Focus

In the past two years, I had travelled to many awesome fire lookouts, some with observers in residence and many without.  This year, I added a few new lookout hills to my “visited” list, including one so remote (Chungo) that it didn’t make Mike Potter’s fire lookouts guidebook, and one way down on the US border in a distant corner of the Flathead Valley in southern BC.

I did a lot more that visit fire lookout hills this year, enjoying many other adventures, into some well-known and much lesser known corners of the Canadian Rockies.

Overall, my focus was to pick interesting places to explore, whether they be well-known trails or more off-the-beaten-track.

Areas Explored

As in the past two years, I traveled up and down the mountains, to the US border in southern BC, north to the mountains of Jasper National Park, west into British Columbia and east to the remote country north of the David Thompson Highway.

I made full use of my National Parks pass with several trips to Banff National Park in Alberta, and also to Jasper and Yoho National Parks.  Of course I was a frequent visitor to most corners of Kananaskis Country west of Calgary.  And when I wanted a change, I made good use of the pathways in the valleys and hills close to, or within, the City of Calgary.

2011 Statistics

In 2011, I kept up the momentum for a third straight year.  This year’s statistics are shown in the table below.

Here are some of the statistical “peaks” for the year:

Highest Point:  The highest point reached all year was the south ridge of Wilcox Peak in Jasper National Park on August 3rd. 

At 8,860 feet, I had a bird’s eye view of the Columbia Icefields.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

Greatest Height Gain:  The greatest height gain in one hike was 2,960 ft. on my 19 km journey across the Highwood River to Bishop Ridge on September 4th.  From here I could look down to Loomis Lake and the Elk Range mountains.

 Longest Single Day Trip:

The greatest distance achieved in one single day was a 33 kilometre trip by foot and bike, along Redearth Creek up to Shadow Lake in Banff Park on September 30th. 

Rocks were tumbling off the soaring cliffs of Mt. Ball (10,860 ft.).

Other Memorable Statistics:

• The three day trip which M and I made to Chungo Lookout in August involved a total of 40.1 kilometres, 2,756 vertical feet, and 68 creek/river crossings.
• Excluding the Shadow Lake trip, I did twelve single-day trips involving more than 18 km, including two cross-country ski trips.
• In a three day period in June I did several hikes in BC totaling 35 km and overall elevation gain of 5,445 ft.
• During my five day trip to Banff and Jasper National Parks in August, I travelled 67.4 km for a height gain of 7,130 ft.
• Right at the end of the year I made a long circuit by foot and snowshoe of the lower slopes of Moose Mountain, covering 24.3 km and a height gain of 2,215 ft.

Statistics
2011
Distance	591.3 km (hike)         + 222.5 km (bike)         +   76.7 km (X-C ski)   +   69.9 km (snowshoe) = 960.4 km   TOTAL
Height Gain	81,669 ft. (24,893 m)
Highest Point	8,860 ft.  ( 2,700 m)
Trail Time	276.0 hours
Camping	22 nights

Comparing 2011 with 2009 and 2010

2011 was another amazing year.  It seemed impossible that I could match the statistics from 2009 and 2010, but I did.  In fact, I beat the previous highest elevation gained, and came close to previous years in all other statistics, as this table shows.

Comparisons
Measure	2009	2010	2011
Dist. (km)	970	1,099	960
Gain (ft.)	64,767	94,428	81,669
Max El. (ft.)	8,253	8,415	8,860
Time (hrs.)	234	300	276
Camps (nts)	22	19	22

So in the past three years, I have travelled in total over 3,000 km, for an overall height gain of over 240,000 ft (more than eight Mount Everests - from sea level), and have camped out (tent or Boler) for sixty three nights.

Highlights of my 2011 Adventures

Greatest achievement of 2011 was clearly the successful expedition to Chungo Lookout.  This was not in any guidebook.  There was no obvious way to get there.  But I figured it out, and with the help of M we pulled off a famous victory.

Coming close to Chungo was my trip to the Flathead Valley to climb Mt. Hefty and visit the abandoned Canada-US border post at Flathead.  It took me two attempts to get there, but I succeeded.  This was a remote location only accessible by travelling 80 kilometres across a mountain range on gravel roads (and the final stretch to the border on my mountain bike).

But this year was packed with so many more success stories:

• Some of the best snow conditions I can ever recall allowed several cross-country ski and snowshoe outings into the mountains, well into Spring.
• The trip into BC and down into the Castle area opened up some remote hiking country accessed by rough and often unmarked mountain roads.
• My hikes in Banff, Yoho and Jasper National Parks confirmed to me how special the Canadian Rockies are, and how lucky I am to be able to travel popular yet breathtakingly beautiful mountain trails.
• Kananaskis Country continues to bring new surprises, even after almost thirty years of hiking there.  This year I made over thirty trips into the Elbow, Sheep, Highwood and Kananaskis Valley areas.  I snow-shoed up to the top of the Bull Creek Hills, ski’d all round the Kananaskis Valley ski trails, saw the troll at frozen Troll Falls, climbed above the clouds on Wasootch Ridge, scaled the cliffs above Ribbon Falls by hoisting myself up the metal chains, visited two ice caves, roamed across the windswept 8,000 ft. Plateau Mountain, crossed rivers, explored remote trails, returned to favorite corners, and enjoyed every journey into K Country.
• I enjoyed walks in the Cross Conservation Area just south of the City and was an early visitor to the stunning new Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park northwest of Calgary, opened this year.  Here is easy hiking but with spectacular views and good trails.
• I hiked to Siffleur Falls in the Kootenay Plains, entered a photo contest, and won a framed picture of the Siffleur River!

• Thanks to M, I occasionally abandoned my tent in favor of her Boler trailer, which made my overnight trips altogether more luxurious – as befitting a 60 year old!
• And lots more!!!

Looking Ahead

I wrote last year that I do all these trips because I enjoy it.  What better reason?

Perhaps sometimes I come close to making this an obsession.  Every week I am out doing something.  I have been fortunate over the past two years to have had little hindrance to my outdoor plans.  And I have been very fortunate with my health, not missing out on a single trip in the past three years. 

I already have a long list of hikes I want to do in 2012, so I would like to keep this going for a little longer if I can. Perhaps I’ll take it at a slower pace, and with less focus on the statistics.  We’ll see. 

The Passionate Hiker

Calgary, Alberta

December 31st, 2011