The Point

Thurs./Fri. 27/28 December:  To the Point

I had been planning this short trip for some time.  The temperatures had been frigid for a couple of weeks, but then I noticed a sudden warming trend in the forecast, and so hurriedly put my plan into place.  The definition of “cold” and “warm” has a different meaning in December in the Canadian Rockies.  To me, cold means minus twenty C and below.  Warm means perhaps around ten degrees below freezing.

My planning had included checking the rating of my goose down sleeping bag (minus 10 C), adding an outer and inner bag, buying a small snow shovel, and carefully preparing my camping list.  When I laid out the gear I thought I needed for the trip, I had about twice as much as I could carry.  Even after some major reductions, I was left with a backpack which weighed between 50 and 55 pounds – much heavier than I have carried since my younger days in Scotland, well over three decades ago.  I was confident I could carry it the relatively short distance needed to reach my campsite.  It was heavy, but I managed it alright.

The idea was to snowshoe westwards along the northern shore of the Upper Kananaskis Lake, to the Point back-country campsite, a journey of about three and a half kilometres.  I knew the area well, so was confident of my route.  I would stay either one or two nights, perhaps exploring locally, but staying close to the campsite which was safe from avalanches.  There can hardly be a more spectacular setting for a campsite than Point.  There are twenty sites spread out in the trees on a peninsula of land stretching out into the wide lake.  All around are spectacular mountains, several of them rising to well over ten thousand feet.  I was expecting there to be snow on the ground, but was perhaps a little surprised to find how much snow had already accumulated.

I could tell that nobody had camped here recently, although a set of snowshoe prints showed where at least one day tripper had travelled through the campsite.  I chose the only really sensible site, which was adjacent to the snow-covered wood-pile and the elevated cylindrical biffy.  There must have been a foot of snow lying on the ground, and so my first task was to shovel off the picnic table and tramp down the snow to make a tent base.  And, of course, I needed to start a fire as it was still around minus twelve degrees that morning.

The fire proved to be a challenge.  I had carried a complete fire log with me, thinking it would be good for two nights as well as two morning fires.  In the end, I used the whole log up, just to get the fire started.  I worked on the fire patiently for an hour or more, chipping logs with my axe to make kindling, and it finally caught.  There was a lot more smoke than fire, and it looked as if it had gone out several times.  It never did amount to much, but was just enough to warm up my feet.

I strolled through the snowy campsite, down the hillside to the upper section of the lake, to admire the fine mountain winter landscapes.  Towering above me were Mount Sarrail (10,413 ft.) and Mount Lyautey (10,112 ft.).  The lake certainly looked safe enough to walk on, but I had been warned of strange currents, so I stayed on the shoreline.

Later in the afternoon, some swirling gusts of wind blew the snow off the trees and into my camp, but overall it was a calm, sunny day here below the Great Divide wall.  I cooked up some delicious turkey slices and L’s home made gravy, followed by some fresh fruit and chocolate.  It was a very early night for me.

The big test of course was whether I would be warm enough overnight.  It was a clear night, with temperatures dropping to around minus fourteen C with gusts of wind giving a wind chill of below minus twenty.  My tent was pitched on the packed snow.  The first layer inside my tent was my silver emergency blanket, followed by my inflatable insulated mat.  Then my sleeping bag with its outer liner and inner fleece liner.  When goose down gets wet, it loses its insulation values, so the outer liner keeps it dry.  This worked really well. Overnight the frost formed inside the tent, coating the inside of the tent roof.  My bag remained dry.  It took a while for me to warm up, but this sleeping arrangement worked well and I remained warm, as long as I wore my wooly hat and kept my face covered under the hood of my sleeping bag.

It was a cloudless night, and, as I discovered afterwards, a full moon.  The moon rose in the northwest around 4.30 p.m. and shone brightly across the campsite all night.  This date also marks the latest sunrise of the year (8.40 a.m.), although a beautiful light-blue dawn light was shining through the trees almost an hour earlier.  I had survived the winter camping test.

It took a little while for my stove to heat up the porridge, as it had been cold enough to freeze the gas line, but it did the job in the end.  The fire had burned some of the night but I could not revive it, and my feet were getting cold.  So I decided that one night out here would be quite enough!  After making an efficient job of striking camp, I was on the trail before ten a.m.

I noticed that the trail which leads from the campsite to the Lower Kananaskis Falls was free of any footprints, either human or animal.  The snow lay across the path, and I only gave short consideration to extending my trip to the Falls.  However, I was bold enough to drop down to the lake and follow a snowed-in trail back along the edge of the lake.  This was a magical journey, first beside the frozen lake, then up over a hillside, before returning to the lakeside again.  Over three kilometres of rocky shoreline, with stunning all-round views of the wintry mountain scene.  This route also saved me the climb up through the boulder field and back down to the lake.

As I came within sight of the trailhead, I saw three guys striding out across the middle of the lake, towards the Hidden Lake shore.  I was still tempted to travel out to one of the islands, but stayed on the shoreline.  In the bay beside the car park, a couple of ice fishing tents were erected on the ice, and a small party of people was preparing for a day’s fishing.

Arriving back at the car, I dropped my heavy pack on the ground with some relief.  A lady and three male colleagues were curious to know if I had been out overnight and I think they were somewhat in awe that I had been camping in the snowy wilderness.  Their plan was to do a short snowshoe trip to Rawson Lake.  It dawned on me too late that they were starting at the wrong car park, so I hope they realized their mistake early enough to correct it.

In the meantime, I was glad to clamber into the car and return slowly back up the Kananaskis Valley and out onto the Trans-Canada Highway.  It was a stunning winter’s day, cloudless, and there were many vehicles heading down into the valley as I drove north.  The cross-country ski trails would be busy today, as well as the ski hill at Nakiska.

I had achieved my goal, which for me had been a stretch.  My planning had been successful, the gear had worked (apart from the iced up stove), and I had enjoyed the experience of a winter’s night out in the snowy wilderness of Kananaskis Country.  And it gave me the opportunity to add more landscape photos to the growing collection of pictures that nobody will ever look at!

Statistics (round trip)
The Point, Upper K. Lake
Thurs./Fri. 27/28 December
Total Dist.	7.4 km (‘shoe)
Height Gain	150 ft.
Max. Elev.	5,760 ft.
Time on trail	3 hrs. 13 mins.

Other Stats.
Thursday: Dep. car:        9.53 am The Point:   11.20 am Friday: Dep. camp:    9.50 am Arr. car:       11.36 am	O/night temperatures around minus 14 C with wind chills down to minus 24 C. Sunny, light W breeze, gusting at night.