Mt. Hoffmann

Sat. 11 August:  Mount Hoffmann

New routes in familiar country.  And it’s thanks to the latest edition of the Kananaskis Country Trail Guide, Vol.4, which was published just the other day (observant readers might recognize a name on page 6).

Today I had to make a very early start to fit everything into a busy day.  Also, the forecast suggested rain showers before noon.  So I headed out to the Sheep Valley the previous evening as the sun was setting behind the Rockies.  There’s plenty of room in the Jeep for a person to stretch out and get a good night’s sleep – that is, once the Conservation Officer had been persuaded to bend the rules about camping overnight at Indian Oils trailhead.  He came back twice during the night to check I was safe (I guess).

I was on the trail before 6.30 a.m., but was a little disappointed to find that a cloudless night had been replaced by a dull, misty morning.  It never did clear up.  This was more like a Scottish day, with low cloud hiding the mountains, and mist lying on the foothill summits.

The most spectacular part of the hike was right at the start, with the crossing of the bridge over the magnificent Tiger Jaw falls.  The fire lookout access road (Sheep Trail) was a familiar route to me, as it climbed the forested hillside in gently sloping uphill waves.  What was new to me, and I had never noticed it before, was a clearly visible logging road which branched off the trail near its high point below Mt. Hoffmann.  I had walked past this junction countless times before without ever noticing it.  This path leading to the summit of Mt. Hoffmann would be my route today.

The guide book only added this trail in the latest edition, and warned of some tricky route-finding higher up.  In the end, there was no difficulty with finding my way.  Some kind person had flagged the route, and had done such a good job that even the most unobservant hiker could not possibly have missed the trail of orange tape as it wandered up the slopes and through the heavy forest, up to the summit.

This old logging road was fairy overgrown, but the trail was clearly well used, possibly most often by horseback riders.  After a while I came out into a clearing where a logging camp used to be.  There was no sign of the old bedsteads and rusted cans mentioned in the guidebook.  But the book was right in warning of a steep section leading from the far end of the camp.  It was steep!

The flagging came in very handy higher up where the trail meandered through fallen trees across a wide, flat hilltop before coming out of the forest a few hundred yards below the rounded, bare summit.  A small inukshuk sat on the top, which was enveloped in a light mist.  The mountain wall to the west was completely hidden from view by low cloud.  This was an uncharacteristically dull day, more reminiscent of a morning in England or Scotland.  It might have deteriorated into a drizzly or rainy day, but it stayed dry and even tried to clear a little.

My guidebook suggested that the trail continued on further, to the next tree-covered summit a kilometre or so further west.  To reach there I had to drop down a few hundred feet, and then up again from a col to the next top.  But it wasn’t that easy.  There must have been a huge wind storm up here since the guidebook was written.  The hillside was a mass of fallen trees.  With patience I charted a route down the mountainside which avoided most of the fallen trees.  Once at the col, I managed to find a route up to the top, through more deadfall.  On a clear day it would have been worth it.  From this second peak, there were unobstructed views of the Front Ranges.  Today they were swallowed up in the cloud. But below me I could see the end of the Sheep Valley and the Bluerock campsite directly at my feet.

I retraced my steps to the summit, then down through the woods as far as the logging camp.  Here, a side trail took me to a couple of additional hilltops, with some interesting rounded rock formations on the western side, called “The Humps”.  From the top of the second hill, I could see directly down to Indian Oils trailhead and the Sheep Valley road.  Distant foothills rolled away to north and to south.

It was a simple job to return down off the hillsides to the Sheep trail, and then down to Tiger Jaw falls.  Near to the bottom of the trail, I saw a magnificent bighorn sheep with huge horns, standing on the trail looking away from me.  He had spotted someone coming up the trail, but had failed to notice me.  Both the sheep and I got a shock as a tiny white dog came racing round the corner, aiming at the sheep.  They both disappeared off into the trees as two young women came into view, yelling for all they were worth for the dog to come back.  This was the makings of a mini-tragedy, but luckily it worked out right in the end – except that I had been tempted to tell them to keep their dog on a leash.

So in no time at all I had recrossed the Sheep River bridge, and was back at the car.  It had been an intriguing experience on a new route.  On a clear day (as had been forecast for this morning), the views from the summits would have been well worth the journey.  And even today, when the views were limited, it was nostalgic to see mist on the tops and cloud hiding the peaks.   All it lacked was a rain shower – and that was predicted for later in the day.

Statistics
Mount Hoffmann
Sat. 11 August
Total Dist.	11.0 km (hike)
Height Gain	2,440 ft.
Max. Elev.	6,620 ft.
Time	4 hrs. 25 mins.

Other Stats.
Start:             6.24 am Summit:         7.46 am 2nd Peak:       8.24 am Summit:         9.07 am 3rd Peak:     10.01 am Ret. to car:   10.49 am Temp: Rising to +15 C Overcast, mist slowly clearing, warm.	Elev. Gains (ft.): Car-Summit:  1,570 Col-2nd Pk:       300 Col-Summit:      400 Path-3rd Pk:      170 Total:            2,440