*I hope people use their own wise judgement when hiking always plan ahead and be prepared. One should never go beyond their abilities.*

Over the years I've had a few goals my first was to Summit all the Peaks of Waterton. Here is My Waterton Summit List I completed that goal on September 26, 2016.

My next goal I'm still working on and that is to summit the 6 10,000 foot Summmits of Glacier National Park. I have one left Kintla.

My 2018 Goal that I accomplished was to summit 40 peaks in my 40th year and that I finished on September 26, 2018.

Not sure what will be my next goal, once Glacier's Summits are done?

I commonly use 3 Hashtags on my social media. The first one is #itookthepathlesstraveledby which is to reference this blog. The next two relate to my father and grandfather who were also hikers. #milesformarkellingson is to remember my
Dad, Mark Ellingson and #dustfromthetrailandhowitsettledonme is to remember my Grandfather Earl Ellingson

October 26, 2015

Guartantua Cave Boy Scout Camp August 20, 2015

I'm a Boy Scouts of Canada Scout Leader on the side and a couple times a year I get the privilege of taking a group of boys out camping in nature.  This year we were fortunate enough to go and try out the Gargantua Caves in the Crows nest Pass of Alberta.  We camped on the Alberta side of the Gargantua cave trail for a few days and climbed up the B.C. side to get to the Gargantua Caves.  It was a beautiful day and one the boys will never forget.  This was my second time in the caves as I had gone with a small group in August of 2014.  This trip was just as fun but a little slower growing with our large group of mostly inexperienced mountaineering boys.  Pictures are hard to take in the caves but I tried my best to get some good shots of the adventure.  We got out a little late from the caves and actually had to descend back to our vehicles in the dark, good thing we had headlights!  We actually didn't get back to the base camp till about 1 o'clock in the morning after hiking since 9 or 10 am the previous day.
Heading up to the cave

Our group of 12 and 13 year old scouts (hazy day from forest fires)

Quaint little stream in a wooded area 

The B.C. side of the caves that we came up is quite a barren treeless scramble

More of the barren scramble

The opening to the cave in the upper right corner of picture

Opening of cave on the left and hiker coming across the path to the cave

Looking down and out of the cave at what we climbed up

Inside the cave looking out

First rappel of the day (longest too, about 60 feet)

Another view of the first rappel

There were many tight squeezes along the way

Another spot we had to rappel down

Going into the famous "birth canal" this is just before you exit to the outside. We were probably in the cave for about 5 or 6 hours at this point and were ready to get out but you have to gear down and climb about 15 feet through this tiny little squeeze.  It is not for the claustrophobic. 

Pictures never do justice but this is my hand in respect to the birth canal

I'm through waiting for my pack to get passed to me again I tried to give the size some perspective by showing my foot in the end of the birth canal

This is Brad climbing through the birth canal

After the birth canal yo have to climb on your hands and knees for about 60 feet through what I call the worm hole.

Our head lamp guided decent (sorry for the poor picture) 

Google Track of Hike

 Stats of Hike:
Total distance: 7.68 km (4.8 mi)
Total time: 6:00:34
Moving time: 5:00:49
Average speed: 1.28 km/h (0.8 mi/h)
Average moving speed: 1.53 km/h (1.0 mi/h)
Max speed: 10.80 km/h (6.7 mi/h)
Average pace: 46:58 min/km (75:35 min/mi)
Average moving pace: 39:11 min/km (63:04 min/mi)
Fastest pace: 5:33 min/km (8:56 min/mi)
Max elevation: 2478 m (8131 ft)
Min elevation: 1609 m (5280 ft)
Elevation gain: 889 m (2916 ft)
Max grade: 49 %
Min grade: -49 %

Recorded: 8/20/2015 9:22 AM
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