Skip to main content

Day 97 - Banff to Jasper

Parker Ridge is the northernmost trail in Banff Park and the views of the Saskatchewan Glacier are up close and personal. The pre global warming--human Industrial Age length of the glacier is clearly visible in grey. I sat and pondered life-nature-being-joy. 


After hiking along Parker Ridge north toward Mount Athabasca, I drove up the road a bit to the Wilcox Pass trail, one of the famous Jasper Park trails. Like the Helen Lake trail yesterday, you climb to the hidden valley and are quickly greeted with vistas of the icy mountains, glaciers, Icefields and green-blue valleys. The Columbia Icefield, a high alpine valley set between a half dozen towering mountains and filled with ice 600 feet thick in spots, was the star of the vista. 


I hiked to Wilcox Pass and then turned left toward the Icefield and famous Athabasca Glacier, where you can ride a special truck up and walk on the glacier. Once at the far ridge, I hiked toward Mount Wilcox, enjoying the views and peace of this wonderful place. I followed the ridge as it climbed up the mountain. Eventually I had to put my hiking poles away and scramble up the sticky rock spires as the ridge narrowed, wind picked up, and snowbanks got closer. Another hiker, the man in red, climbed up behind me, eventually passing me on a lower route as I breaked for a snack. His presence was comforting so I pushed on higher, eventually pulling myself up a narrow shute to a high verticals spite summit. The route was pretty basic and safe, the rock sticky and solid, but climbing at such altitude with snowy peaks all around made me feel alive--focused in, present, on. 


The actual summit was one or two spires up, but I felt accomplished and satisfied with the point I reached.  The  guidebook said the cross between the north and south peaks were dangerous and I wasn't sure exactly which high peaks I was looking at. I decided to climb down. 

On the way down, I saw the man in red making what looked like a very dangerous cross below toward a vertical ridge and his obvious target, the true summit. When he paused at a safe spot, I called out to see if he was okay. He said he was. He asked about my high route and I said it was safe, but I didn't try for the summit. He continued on. See him here in red crossing the snow in bottom left. 


He made it to the ridge and disappeared beyond view.  After reaching a safe spot on my down-climb, I spotted him again returning back across the dangerous crossing. I waited for him to make it across for fifteen minutes, in case he needed help. He made it and I climbed down, happy to be safely down from danger. 


On the return, I must have looked back toward Mount Wilcox twenty times.  Something in me wishes I had pushed on further to the summit. Why did I stop?  How far up was I?  Which snowfield was the red man crossing?  These must be the musings of the mountaineer. 


Back in the van, I continued my ritual of driving the scenic road north to the start of tomorrow's climb. Tonight's drive took me by the "Endless Chain Ridge" and into a campground just outside Jasper town, and the northern edge of my road trip journey. 



Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Day 161 - JMT Purple Lake and Tully Hole

We got our first glimpse of smoke far across the valley as we climbed higher. Up on a ridge after a morning climb, we followed a side trail to an open viewpoint beyond the trees. Selfie:) The smoke, while visible, seemed to give the mountains a blue glow-- like a highlighter to a sketch. You could still see the edges of the mountain ridges, the story of their creation. We could hike in this. But the smoke looked worse farther south. Or it was getting worse as time rolled incessantly forward.  On day two we had ran into a northbound hiker we nicknamed Speedy Steve. Speedy Steve had hiked 18 miles a day through eight consecutive smoke-filled days, including atleast three "very bad days" when he couldn't see the surrounding mountains, the sun glowed a haunting orange and ash accumulated overnight. On the way to Purple Lake we ran into three dirty, beat up, tired north-bound hikers with a similar story. They had to spend one night in an emergency hut at Muir Pass to avoid the...

Day 172 - JMT Mount Whitney

Our day began in silence, at 315am in pursuit of the summit.  We walked carefully, looking for slick, sandy rocks and icy sections--not wanting to fall. Hiking along a cliff edge in total darkness was thrilling, vividly black and white.  By 5am, we had reached the three mile marker and the turnoff up to Whitney summit. We removed the heavy items from our bags and set off towards the summit sunrise. The trail was spectacular, a special creation of this nation, winding from one side of the mountain to the other, going down and around one side before coming up to another, creating anticipation with each turn. Looking back, the sloping ridges caught the early sunset delicately.  As we hiked along the two mile upper trail, the views east would open up for the narrowest of moments.  This opening was my favorite.  14,000 foot cathedrals of nature thrusted towards the heavens at each turn. The summit was almost in sight, the highest peak in the lower 48 states nearly at...

Day 52 - Mesa Verde

The Anasazi first settled on the mesa tops of Mesa Verde in 500 AD, then moved into the cliff dwellings this park is famous for in 1100 AD, then mysteriously abandoned the area entirely in 1300 AD. Like the other tourists, I was interested in seeing the cliff dwellings!  Unfortunately many sites are closed in Colorado until Memorial Day, so I wasn't able to go into the two largest dwellings, Cliff Palace or Long House, settling instead for Balcony House.  Balcony House is a small cliff dwelling built in a defensive posture on an inaccessible cliff. You have to climb a 30 foot ladder to enter the dwelling and then you have to crawl through a 3 foot wide hole and up more ladders to exit. Adventure and history are a nice combo. The ranger taught us about building techniques, spiritual structures and customs, and theories about the Anasazi culture and disappearance (draught or war). Pics.  After the guided tour of Balcony House, I did self-guided tours of a historical museum,...