Table Mountain Castle Wilderness May 26, 2018

So the third year in a row we had a church Father's and Son's camp and for the third year in a row I went hiking with one of my boys.  Carter my oldest would have come but he hurt his hip running at his zone track meet this week (he still finished 3rd in the 3000m run with a 10:39 time).  So my youngest boy came along and we joined another father and a couple of his kids too.  We started pretty late since we had slept in pretty late.  The day looked like it might be a rainy one but the clouds were able to stay clear enough that we didn't have much for precipitation the entire day.  I think this is the 5th time I had gone up this mountain.  I actually think it was the first mountain I have ever climbed.  Well we had technically never reached the true summit.  Most people just climb to what I refer to as the Table Top and turn back but the true summit lies about 2km to the east.  Well today we made it to the true summit and it was actually a nice pleasant ridge walk over there and the view back on the Table top was tremendous.  I got a few more good looks at Castle Peak today as well and a good view of Victoria Peak which we had done a few days before.  As we looked down on the Beaver Mines/Camp Impressa area below I was reminded that it had been 28 years since I was a 12 year old boy going to my first big scout camp as a kid and it was a week long camp at Impessa.  Many fond memories came to my mind as I though of all the great times I'd had in this area over the years.  Aside from Waterton I think I have camped more at this place than any other.  This is a pretty area and now with Waterton shut down for a bit this more secluded area may become more known and busy.

Last year we climbed this in March and this creek bed was covered in snow and we were able to slide down the snow, not now though

Looking back on the creek bed

On first little lookout looking towards the west

My favourite tree hiking.  I always pass this tree every time I climb Table

On Table Top, the true summit is the high point behind us

Beaver Mines/Camp Impessa view

Father and Son on Table Top

Larch Trees a little further along here than a few days ago on Victoria

Had to walk on a little snow on the way to the true summit

Summit Shot

View over to Table Top with my son in the middle

Looking back at the summit where my boy would have been standing in the picture above

Castle Peak in the middle

Traversing back to Table Top

One last view from Table Top

Easy descent shale ski

Beautiful snow partially covered mountains in the distance

Guess what we did after the hike! End of a good Father's and Son's weekend

Video on Table Top

Video on Summit

Panorama from Summit

Track of Hike

Victoria Peak and Ridge South Castle May 21, 2018

A few months ago I thought it would be neat to hike Victoria Peak on Victoria Day.  So today came around and we went and did it.  At the start of the day I figured the peak alone would be good enough, but after making good time to get to the top we figured lets go for the Ridge as well.  Well it was a long, long day.  In total 27+ km's and 10+hours of hiking.  I'm exhausted, but it was a spectacular day.  The few downsides were that I forgot the sunscreen and will be paying for that for a few days.  I got a sweet head band sunburn!  The summit of the Peak was so beautiful, hardly a breath of wind, we didn't stay long however, because of the bugs on top.  No wind usually means bugs.  The traverse to the ridge was quite pleasant, it was just long and luckily the remaining snow was packed enough that we didn't have to post hole much.  However, once we started descending after the Ridge the trail was hard to find in all the snow.  Luckily we saw some tracks that helped with that.  We later noticed that these tracks were bear tracks and they were pretty fresh.  Anyways we continued but made more noise.  We followed the tracks for probably about 5-6 km.  He was pretty good and keeping on the trail and we figured it was his sense of knowing the neighborhood.  If it had been up to us we would have spent way more time trying to find the trail through all the snow.  It would have taken us way longer.  Great day except maybe next time I'll bring a bike as well the 7 or 8 extra kilometers of walking could have been a lot easier.

The beginning of our 3.5 km walk Victoria Peak right of center

This is where we started our scramble

A bunch of dead trees on the way up, must have had a forest fire years ago.  Pincher ridge behind

First of our snow for the day

Starting to see more summits all around.  Victoria Ridge on far right.

Last climb before the summit

First view of Windsor ridge and Castle Peak...Awesome view all day

Our next goal to go down the ridge on the ridge and traverse to the peak on the left

Summit Photo on Victoria Peak

Another view of Windsor and Castle.  Once we got to Victoria Peak, Windsor Peak would block Castle Peak, that shows how far we climbed back in there

Luckily the snow hadn't melted much and was still hard enough to walk on without any problem

Heading over to the false summit on the left

Once on the false summit this is what we saw.  It was probably the worst false summit ever!

Summit of Victoria Ridge, number 2 summit for the day

Looking west into B.C.

Looking north to Windsor and Castle, notice how Castle is almost hidden

Tracks of our bear friend that we followed

This is why we kept loosing the trail, still covered in snow in places

Fun little snow pack we were able to slide down and yes the bear tracks also slid down this hill!

Track of Hike 

Panorama on Victoria Peak

Video on Summit of Victoria Peak

Video on the way to Victoria Ridge

Panorama on Victoria Ridge

Video on Victoria Ridge

Mt. Royal Sweet Grass Hills May 5, 2018

Well today being my birthday it was time for another hike.  Today was a family hike and for the 2nd weekend in a row we headed to the Sweet Grass Hills south of the border.  We had been up pretty late the night before and didn't get out as early as I would have liked.  We eventually made it and started our hike.  Some of the kids were not excited today to be hiking.  Anyways our goal to start the day was to maybe summit both Mt. Royal and Mt. Brown and to visit a cave along the way.  Well we got to the cave first and from there I realized the entire party wasn't going to make it.  So my oldest son and I started for Mt. Royal and left everyone else at the cave.  The cave was kind of neat but there was a lot of animal poop, so we didn't stay long.  Well the rest of the summit seemed to be going well then we got to within the last few 100 feet from the summit and it turned awful.  It was a north facing slope that was covered in pretty thick trees and the snow hadn't melted yet and at times it was waist deep.  It was a pretty good grunt the last little bit and the snow was wet and the post holing was awful.  Anyways we summited and realized we wouldn't be making it to Mt. Brown so headed down a different way to avoid the north treed slope.  We got down rejoined the rest of the family and hiked back to the vehicle.  I usually take a panorama from the summit, but the summit view was obstructed by so many trees and radio towers I figured it wasn't worth the picture.

Start of Hike

Cluster of flowers at the beginning

View of the east side of the East Butte comples

Looking back at our vehicle

Slowly rising above the prairie

Now into the trees

Open meadow on the way up

This almost looks like a trail in the rockies

The black hole in the rocks is the skylight of the cave

Inside the cave

Outside the cave my son in the middle is standing by the entrance you have to crawl into

Another shot looking back at the cave.  The meadow below would be a great place to stay if there wasn't so much cow manure around

Our goal for the day Mt. Royal

This was the beginning of the snowy trees north slope slog to the summit

This was a rare open spot where the snow wasn't as deep and we actually could see Mt. Brown behind us which looked much easier to approach from here!

On top looking west towards Gold Butte on left and West Butte in the middle

Another view of Mt. Brown which would have been so much easier from this view...next time eh!

All the radio equipment on top of Mt. Royal...kind of ruined the view

View to what is called the East Butte on some maps (east of Mt. Royal)

The cave is in the center of this picture and the high hill in the background is called Mt. Lebanon

On the way back walking through the forested area

Another flower picture

Back on prairie

A cairn where we parked our vehicle looking at East Butte summit behind the cairn

This is the gate to access this area.  We needed to get permission to enter this private land and were grateful the Meissner Ranch was so nice in letting us enter for the day.

This is the Ranch to ask permission to access the trail head.  It is located a few miles south of the gate where you start

Video inside Cave

Summit Video

Track of Hike