*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

November 09, 2016

Mt. Blakiston November 9, 2016

This fall of 2016 has had some incredible weather.  So I got invited to go for a hike and decided to take a day off work.  It was the night after Donald Trump won the American election and I had not got to bed till about 12:30 am and got up at 4:30 so we could be on the trail early.  Anyways aside from no sleep it was a spectacular day.  10 out of 10 on the view-o-meter!  When mountains are snow capped they sure look amazing and the day was nice and sunny, it was just a little windy at times but that is to be expected in Waterton.  Our group started on the trail with our headlamps and by the time we reached the ravine to start heading up it was light enough to ditch the head lamps.  We summited just after 11:00am.  We had hopes of doing the Hawkins horseshoe but the wind was too strong and the snow looked too deep on the ridge around Lineham Lakes.  The summit views today were spectacular, maybe the best 360 view of the mountains you can get.  It helps that Blakiston is the highest peak around!  So the wind was pretty strong up top so we didn't stay long but headed down basically the same way we came and headed home.  Awesome hike for almost mid-November!

Early morning hike, just getting light enough to see Mt. Lineham

Mt. Lineham behind us as we headed to Blakiston

A bunch of Rams on the way up, they didn't seem to care about us

Funky rock was everywhere on this scree slope

One of my all time favorite shots in Waterton the beautiful Lineham Lakes and back-dropped with snow capped peaks behind them

Looking west towards Hawkins, as yo can see there was a little more snow over there

The rest of the group getting some wind shelter before summiting

A closer picture of the Lineham Lakes

Kinnerly and Kintla Peaks

Long Knife Peak

Me (Summit #20 for the year)

Me again with the beautiful vista behind

The snow was soft enough that we were able to not slide too far and it was faster than hiking down on the shale

Nearing the end and almost regaining the Lineham Falls Trail

Sun ducking behind Lineham as we got back to the trail

Panorama on Summit

Video on Summit

Map my Hike Path of Hike



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