Victoria Peak

Victoria Peak has been on my list for a while. I had a spare day, so figure it would be a good place to go check out. Unfortunately attempts to find a partner were unsuccessful, so I found myself heading up after work on Friday by myself. The plan was to go fast and light, and pack only what was abolutely necessary. I had pretty good beta on the route, so figured I could manage with failry minimal gear, but I did bring along a 30m rope and home-made light sling harness for rapelling a crux step. I also brought along a +10deg overbag and small sil-tarp, and no stove.

The road in was in decent shape, and I could drive up to about 1000m elevation. I had to walk the last couple of kilometers of road, and then onto the trail. In less than half an hour I was up on the ridge and into the alpine, and then spent another hour or so ridge-running my way up towards the peak. I settled into camp and had a quick dinner, and enjoyed the amazing sunset.

Approach to Victoria Peak

Victoria Peak with route going right to left on the upper snowfield. My bivi site was on the ridge just above the lower snow.

What a camp spot!

Moon rise over the Elk River Valley

It was a cold, clear night (~3 degrees) and my F&L bag didn't quite cut it. I manage to sleep for about 3 hours. It was tough sleeping more than that, and I shivered for a few hours until the sun finally came up. An amazing sunrise and there was a whole ocean of low valley cloud which made for a surreal setting.

The climb went well. There are two options for getting over a step in a ledge accessing the upper snowfield. I took the first one of these, which might have been a little steeper, but was pretty ledgy and had positive holds (the other route looked less steep but more precarious, and had a bit of a hand-line on it). Overall a short (15m) stretch, 4th or easy 5th class. After getting over the crux it was an easy scramble up to the peak.

Warden Peak and a sea of clouds. The clouds make it easy to imagine what the area would have looked like during the last Ice Age.

A happy Woollen Knickers

Back down the route, and rappelled the step with my short rope. Back from a quick snack at camp and back down to the car before the heat of the day hit. What a great spot! Quick, easy access and beautiful spot.

Cherries, Trains, and Stemwinder

Cherry season up in the Similkameen. Kessa went up to help pick cherries and tend to her farm plot, and I came up to lend moral support and look after kids. The whole cherry experience was pretty neat. It is the first main fruit crop of the season, and it was a mad flurry of activity on the farm getting the cherries picked, sorted, packaged and brought to market.

The kids thrive on the farm, and there is so much for them to explore there. Favorite past times are climbing the walnut tree, and this trip they discovered the fun of catching grasshoppers.

Leif has been digging trains a lot lately. He likes that he has a "boy" thing to do, so the two of us had a guys-day-out and checked out the model train place in Osoyoos. It is a huge room with a whole bunch of rail lines and trains running around. The people runing it clearly have a passion for it.

Leif was still pretty stoked on the trains, and wanted to see a "big" train, so I went with the kids to the Kettle Valley Railway out in Summerland. It was pretty neat bit of history. I have been wanting to bike the old railway for a while now. An old steam train runs a small distance of the line, and it is a nice piece of history. They do the ambience up pretty well, including a old-timer playing banjo as the train rolls along.

My last day there we headed out for a hike up Stemwinder Mountain near Hedley. This featured me getting some-what lost (well at least I couldn't find the proper start to the trail). I bumped into a ranch-hand who was up there, and asked for directions to the trail, and he gave me the exact directions to where I was standing talking to him. Funny.

Regardless the trip was a great ecology session with the kids. We got to explore all sorts of plants and the wild strawberries were in season. We were listening to a bird identification CD on the way up, and then we heard a bunch of the birds once we got up there (Red-tailed hawk, Hermit thrush, Swainson's thrush). We also saw a bunch of cattle, and there was a huge colony of ground squirrels. We also played a good game of "Who's poo is this?" which featured fur-filled scat from a coyote (eating the ground squirrels) and after poking around in some pellets Nemiah figured out they belonged to deer. Folks thought it silly I played this game with the kids. Am I the only parent who pokes around poo with their kids?

Lupine

Wild roses

Triple Peak

Once again off to the peaks around Marion Creek out towards Ucluelet. Triple Peak is a bit of an oxymoron for the area. The bushwack approach is a scramble, and the scramble is a bushwack. Bush is notorious on this part of the Island. The approach to Triple is remarkably bush-free. From the cars it was about 20 minutes or so until we hit the waterfall coming out of the lake below the mountain. The route more or less zig-zagged its way right up the waterfall. Pleasant scrambling and some neat positions.



From the lake, the route was snow covered which made for quick going. We headed up to the south ridge of the main peak, and roped up a couple of pitches of 4th and 5th class bush, the crux being a stemming-corner without much gear or handholds other than grabbing some shrubs. Classic!

North peaks on Triple

Heading up to Main Summit

North Summirs
Crux corner

Woolen Knickers

Mackenzie Range

Mountain School 2010

Time for the annual intro to mountaineering school with the Alpine Club. This year I decided to keep the course on the Island and explore some local hills. Ended up being a great spot. Was a little more physical of a trip than I was expecting, but I think everyone enjoyed it nonetheless.

We spent the first day getting to camp below Big Interior. The next day we practiced some ice axe and crevasse rescue skills, then worked our way up Big Interior Mountain, and down the backside (in a white-out). Third day up Nine Peaks, and back over Big Interior to a camp, and fourth day out. Great crew of folks.

In the cirque below Big Interior

Upper snowslopes on Big Interior, with Bedwell Lake and Tom Taylor

Final step on Big Interior

Descending Big Interior below the satellite peak - Marjorie's Load

Nine Peaks in cloud

Heading up Nine Peaks



Nine Peaks summit


Marjorie's Load

Descending the step on Big Interior