Mount Currie

In early September I was stoked when Dean proposed we go to Mount Currie summit.

We parked near the Mount Currie trail just passed the Pemberton Speedway. The trail is steep through the trees and pops you out in the alpine.

Dean near the end of the trail, looking back (West) across the valley.

From the point we contoured counter-clockwise around some sub-summits. Then we went up some talus that was covered with a little fresh snow. The summit looked very imposing from below. Once we reached the ridgeline, we found a good path to the summit.

Dean with the last few steps towards summit.

We had some great views on our way down.

Our return route was definitely more efficient.

We were back at the car after about 13 hours roundtrip. A really great day. This was a fun trip. Dean did a great job of preparing the route-plan before we left.

Soo River Paddle

When Peter proposed we take my kayak down Soo River I was shocked. Isn't that class 4/5 whitewater? He explained that we would be heading down the calmer section above the dam.

We dropped off the kayak at the put-in spot about 13kms down the road on the north side of Soo River. Then we parked the car near the dam and walked back up the road to the put-in spot.

Peter at the put-in spot. We wore wetsuits because this water is glacier cold.

The paddling was fun. Beautiful views of the mountains. A few quicker spots, but nothing too bad, One large logjam we had to cross.

At the logjam just before we carried the boat over.

There is a large rock next to the road around km 4. This would probably have been the better pull out location. We kept going until we got to a point we could go no further, We took the boat out and bushwacked about 20m up to the road, then caried the boat back to the car.

I'm sure glad we wore wetsuits!

A great way to spend an afternoon!

Mount Weart via Wedgemont Lake by Night

In August I went up Mount Weart. Because of my scheduling and also fear of sunburns I decided to try this trip at night. It was a great way to try something new and make a standard trip more interesting.

I left the car at 6:30pm and made my way up the Wedgemont Lake trail as the sun was setting

Looking across the valley towards Rainbow Mountain

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There's a trail around the lake on climber's left. Last bit of light went down just as I passed the lake.

Dusk at Wedgemont Lake

Past the lake I continued beside the glacier and up some slopes. Mostly I moved by moonlight. A few times I turned on the headlamp for routefinding. The photos from Matt Gunn's scrambles book were helpful. I made the summit at 1am. I was back at Wedgemont Lake for sunrise.

First light at Wedgemont Lake

I was back at the car for 9am, drove home and had a snooze.

A few notes:

-I was surprised to find the camping fee box not there. I called BC Parks, they told me that you can no longer pay cash for overnight trips. What a bummer. I explained that I would not be sleeping, they still charged me $15 for the trip, I paid by credit card over the phone. Lucky I had cell signal in the parking lot.

-I was thinking I might like to take a nap in the hut on the way back. But it looked like it was full.

-It was extremely pleasant on the ridgeline with a clear sky and a full moon. The light of the moon reflected off the glaciers prodivded ample light.

Mount Sproatt Hike

I recently moved to Whistler. The view from my patio looks towards Mount Sproatt, so I decided to go up to the top.

View from my patio.

I hiked up different mountain bike trails, using Trailforks as a guide. I made my way up the "Sproatt Alpine Trail". Some friendly guys from WORCA were busy finishing this new trail. After I passed them I bushwacked my way up to the alpine.

The sub-alpine here is very pleasant.

I made my way up to Sproatt summit where there is a summit cairn. From here I could look down to my house.

View from the summit, looking towards Whistler.

Overall a pleasant day. I was out for about 10 hours. Next time I would bring a mountain bike for a quicker trip up and down the bike trails.

Sky Pilot Attempt

In early June, Michal, Ryan and I went to Sky Pilot Mountain.

We parked at Shannon Falls, hiked up, and took the gondola down in the evening.

We started at Shannon Falls parking lot around 7am. We hiked up the Sea to Summit Trail.

A view point on Seat to Summit Trail

Then we hiked a well marked trail towards Sky Pilot. Eventually we popped out of the trees and into snowy alpine.

We kick stepped our way up snow slopes.

Eventually we made our way up to rock near the summit.

Ryan scrambling the pink slab as Michal looks on.

We deviated from the normal Matt Gunn route by replacing the chimney with a sketchy traverse. I decided not to continue. Michal and Ryan headed up to the summit and quickly returned.

Sketchy traverse... more difficult than it looks.

We rappelled the pink slab and had a fun slip-and-slide on the way down snow slopes.

We were happy to arrive at the Gondola just before it closes at 7pm. We each paid $10 for a ride down then walked a few minutes to the car. All together about a 12 hour day. Very nice trip and highly recommend it. Next time I would stick to the Matt Gunn route.

Fort Langley to Vancouver via the Fraser River

Yesterday I finished the final leg of the Fraser River from Hope to home. Ivan came along for the ride.

We took out at River District Park in Vancouver

We skytrained out to Lougheed Station and transferred buses twice to get to Fort Langley.

We put in at Fort Langley boat launch around 2pm.

We stopped for lunch on an island along the way

Just after the Port Mann Bridge

Then we continued home

Heading towards the Pattullo Bridge

We passed lots of tugboats, barges, and various other signs of industry.

A load of demolished cars.

All together an mellow and very enjoyable day!

Mount Macfarlane

On Tuesday I hiked Mount Macfarlane with Michal and Ryan.

Apparently that's 22km roundtrip.

It was a little bit of a foggy day.

First bit's through the trees. It starts to open up near Pierce Lake.

We made our way up some snow slopes to the still-frozen Upper Pierce Lake.

We scrambled a bit to avoid some of the steeper snow slopes near the summit.

We enjoyed a quick snack at the summit cairn then made our way down. Overall a great day!

Flora Peak Snowshoe Attempt

On Friday Mark and I drove out to Chilliwack Lake Provincial Park to snowshoe up Flora Peak.

We also made a detour to Lindeman Lake

We parked along the side of Chilliwack Lake Road and made our way up the Flora Lake Trail. Around 1200m we hit the snowline. Mark was excited to put on his snowshoes.

This aussie's first time on snowshoes!

The main face looked super avalanch-y so we headed up the West ridge. It is a lower angle and has lots of trees. We stayed right to avoid cornices.

This is a sub-summit. True summit is hidden in background.

We decided that conditions looked sketchy near the top, so we did not continue to true summit. We enjoyed some soft-slushy snow and a great view on the way down.

That's Mount Webb on the right. I went up there in a 2015 post!

When we got back to the trailhead, we still had lots of daylight so we made the quick hike over to Lindeman Lake.

Shoes off, socks off, ahhhh life is good.

A few notes:

-We encountered two other people and they were really friendly! Follow them on Instagram @Sparkles2222 and @InTheRiverValley. They told us they had seen an avalanche in the area so be careful!

-Very nice area and great views for little effort!

-Flora Peak would make a great ski.

-I recently started an Instagram. You can find it here.

Mt Sproatt Ski Attempt

Yesterday Brent and I attempted to ski Mount Sproatt. We started from the Rainbow Lake Trail which is located just West of Whistler.

The red lines are very approximate!

We started skinning up.

Narrow creek bridges were tricky!

Around the 3km mark we left the trail and started heading up into the trees and gaining elevation. This is the route described in John Baldwin's book. It was tough skinning up in the the super crunchy snow. It was slow moving and eventually we decided to turn around before we ran out of time!

Brent kept his split board as skis for the way down!

Once we hit the road we got to pick up a little speed.

Go Brent Go!!

One note:

-On snowshoes we probably would have made the summit. I still have a lot to learn about backcountry skiing and skinning up steep terrain.

Alpen Mountain and Split Peak

On Sunday I joined my first ever Wanderung hike. Wanderung is a hiking club you can find more info here. We drove up the Mamquam FSR near Squamish and hiked Alpen Mountain and Split Peak.

Mamquam FSR was a little bumpy, but not too bad.

There is a cabin just off the logging road. It is maintained by a snowmobile club.

Not enough time to take their truck for a joy-ride

After a quick bushwack, the trees cleared and we made our way towards Alpen Mountain.

This is a sub-peak, Alpen Mountain is a little bit in the distance.

Then we made our way up to Split Peak.

I wonder why they call it Split Peak.

On the way down the sky opened up and we got nice views across the valley to the south end of Garibali Park and the west end of Pinecone Burke Park.

Garibaldi in the distance on the right.

A few notes:

-There was almost a foot of snow at 1500m

-The cabin looked fairly nice. It does have an unfriendly "no hikers" sign on the front.

-Wanderung was a great experience! I'll join more hikes in the future!

Brandywine Mountain

On Monday I hiked Brandywine Mountain with Shizuka. It is located West of Whistler, the trailhead is about 2 hours drive North of Vancouver.

This map is super-approximate

From the lower parking area we hiked up to the meadows.

Meadows were beautiful.

Then we scrambled up some rocky areas.

Where's Waldo?

We saw this white bird.

Is it a grouse?

Finally we reached the summit!

We signed the registry at the top.

Tricouni Peak

Last Thursday George and I hiked Tricouni Peak near Squamish.

It took about 2 hours to find the trailhead. There's some new logging roads in this area that make directions confusing. The first 45min-1 hour of the trail was quite muddy. 

There go my new shoes!

After the marshy part the views really opened up!

Tricouni is the pointy peak in the distance

Three glacier blue lakes were highlights of the day!

Upper lake with Tricouni in background

Scramble near the top wasn't too difficult

What! Another blue lake on the other side!

Ah one more photo on the way down.

Well done George!

And.... one more from second lake

A few notes:

-Great day hike, highly recommended. The lakes would make nice camping.

-Trailhead is super tricky to find. A new logging road had covered up the entrance to the road that leads to the trailhead.