My annual fall scrambling / hiking trip took place from September 3rd to the 6th in 2008. Along for the ride was my brother Rod, cousin Jon and his wife Yolande (also known as George for some reason) and Hanneke, my wife. We were all pretty excited to be trying another new area (for us) of the Rockies – the Mount Assiniboine area of British Columbia.
On Saturday, August 30 2008 Keith and I set out to scramble Mount Lipsett and Mist Mountain. I originally wanted to scramble something difficult (like Mount Fox) but the weather was acting up again and it didn’t seem prudent to be on too much difficult terrain with unpredictable weather hovering around.
Originally I was planning on bagging a peak like Burstall but with snow and rain threatening and fresh snow and ice on Burstall’s scramble route I had to change my objective for the day. After wandering around Spray Valley taking photos of the dramatic weather I ended up scrambling up Miner’s Peak and Ha Ling for exercise.
Wietse and I were in the mood to do some quality suffering on Saturday, July 09 2008. We perused the Kane scrambles book, looking for something that would hurt a bit but nothing too technical since neither of us were in the mood to balance on tiny ledges or up anything too tricky this particular weekend.
July 30 2008 was a very weird day in the mountains. And not just because it was a Wednesday or the fact that I was with Kevin Papke on a mountain either. No, there were many things that conspired to make this day a very different one than I had originally planned.
On Friday evening, July 25th 2008, Raf, Keith, Wietse and I hiking into the Little Yoho campground in Yoho National Park with plans to ascent both the President and the Vice President early on Saturday morning.
For some reason, I’ve wanted to scramble Mount Hood for quite a while already. So when Wietse and Kelly were thinking of which scramble to do around the Kananaskis Lakes area I was quick to suggest that one and invite myself along.
Taking advantage of my temporary bachelor status, I took Thursday July 10 2008 off work and drove down to the Crowsnest Pass area to do an interesting and short scramble – Thunder Mountain. Why is this mountain interesting? Well, it’s the first mountain in the Canadian Rockies climbed by a non-aboriginal.
After being thundered off Commonwealth Peak the day before with Raf and Mel, I was more than ready to attain another few summits on Saturday, July 05 2008 with a gang of mountain veterans. I was joining Bill Kerr, Gary Vandergrift, Roy Stadelweiser, Kevin Papke and Keith Bott on a two peak day in Kananaskis Country on Nihahi and Compression Ridges.
After getting out the previous two days on an attempt of Commonwealth and then a great day on Nihahi and Compression Ridges, it was time to visit the Castle / Crown area again. Keith and I drove down to the Gladstone trail head as described in Andrew Nugara’s scrambling book.
I decided early on in 2008 that it was time I bagged a few of the Kane peaks in Jasper National Park. In the span of two weeks I’ve now completed over half of them! Indian Ridge and The Whistlers were my latest Jasper peaks. I shared the pleasure with two nephews and two brother-in-laws on June 30 2008.
After bagging Roche a Perdrix, Morro Peak and Hawk Mountain over the past two days, Wietse and I decided to try our luck on Roche Miette in Jasper National Park. We weren’t assured of success with the sound of rain on our tent the morning of June 22nd but we got up anyway.
After bagging Roche a Perdrix and Morro Peak the day before, we were ready for an easy day out. So, naturally we chose the 5.5 hour trip up Hawk Mountain. Of course we knew that the 5.5 hour time is actually only ONE WAY but still, it sounded short.
After scrambling up Roche a Perdrix it was time to try Indian Ridge. We drove all the way back to Jasper and to the Tramway station only to find that it was closed for maintenance! That was a bugger. Time for a new plan. Since we were all psyched up for another peak we thought we’d give Morro a try. Wietse had come across it while perusing on Bivouac.com. I remember seeing it on there a while back and wondering if it was worth a shot.
On June 19th Wietse and I drove up to Jasper National Park to camp for the weekend and bag a number of local peaks. We were slightly disappointed by the campsite that we were assigned in the Whistlers campground because it seemed very open and public but we quickly got over it and settled in for the night.
June 14th, 2008 found me wanting to bag a peak pretty badly! The spring of 2008 has not been a very friendly one for scramblers and hikers. It’s been wet, and cold and nasty. After much deliberation, Wietse and I decided that we would head down to Waterton for the day, attempting the Lost / Anderson / Bauerman triplicate.
On May 30, 2008 I joined Kevin Papke on the ‘mighty’ Limestone Peak in Kananaskis Country. So far the year 2008 has been pretty slow for me and mountains. Most of this is due to a priority shift on my part and the copious amounts of snow on the weather’s part. I tried getting up Limestone a few weeks ago but turned back because of the snow.
On Saturday April 12, 2008 I joined Wietse and Keith on a tramp up the east ridge of Yamnuska, down into the CMC valley and then up the southeast ridge of the East Peak of Wendell.
Five years ago I read about a little front range peak called Mary Barclay’s Peak in a trip report that Frank Nelson posted on the RMBooks web forums. For some reason it sounded like a trip I wanted to do but I never got around to actually trying it till I read about it again in Andrew Nugara’s new book, More Scrambles in the Canadian Rockies.
On a beautiful day in early March, TJ, Megs, Wietse and I completed the French / Haig/ Robertson ski traverse in the heart of Kananaskis Country under the looming summit of Mount Sir Douglas over the French and Robertson Glaciers.
On Saturday, January 12 2008 I bagged my first peak of the new year. Wasootch Peak is not a glamorous or lofty goal, but it was good exercise and considering it’s mid-January and I was solo, it was a great day out.
On Saturday, December 08 2007 a whole bunch of us skinned up the the ski-out at the Sunshine ski resort in Banff National Park with the intention of bagging a small peak near the ski resort called Twin Cairns.
On November 24th 2007, Wietse and I dragged ourselves out of bed way too early and headed out to the Powderface Trail and the parking area for Tiara Peak and Belmore Brown.
I had a score to settle with Mount Romulus, so when TJ mentioned on the web board that he was going to be attempting it on Friday, November 2 2007, I decided that work could wait. Kevin Papke and Bill Kerr also decided that their work could wait, so we all hooked up on Friday morning and drove two vehicles with our bikes, to the Big Elbow Loop trail head.
On Saturday October 20 2007 Wietse joined me for a repeat slog up into the Castle Mountain environs. This time, thankfully, we actually made it.
