The last couple of weeks, I have been consumed with sports on TV. Owing to the time difference to central Asia, I found myself up most every morning at 4am glued to sports I seldom see other than once every 4 years. I would also wager I saw more cross country skiing - a sport which I more regularly view on the interweb at any time - than I saw when the Games were on in Vancouver. The west coast tended to have the skiing mid-day (when I'm at work!) but the Russians kindly scheduled the ski races at 4am which is a time I am generally free(sort of)... so it worked out well. In the end though the Games came to a close and with the blowing out of the flame I found myself at loose ends.
GLoppet viewing is a nice distraction from Olympic viewing - more fresh air for a start!
Having been up for weeks before the sun it was no problem for me to load up my gear and head to the hills for a day. A chance to clear out the cobwebs and suck in some fresh air. To be fair, I had been skiing quite a bit during the Games (thanks to their early start times I had the rest of the day free (if I wasn’t working)!) but never strayed beyond the Parks trail network. I had managed to get out and enjoy some viewing of the Gatineau Loppet and that involves a fair bit of skiing (coupled with some strategic driving) so at least I was outside during the daylight hours.
Monday saw the car loaded, the pack... umm, packed and the car rolling south well before the sun broke the skyline. My planned destination was a "ski-shoe” to Seymour mountain. Seymour has a long flat approach (even longer in winter with a seasonally closed access road) and then a short (steep) vertical pitch up the peak... before returning whence you came. I had prepped a set of skis and was ready for a day out but when I arrived at the car park it was clear it wasn't going to go as planned. The previous weekend’s rain and warm weather had turned the snowpack into a crusty mess. Add to that the access road – while plowed for a logging operation but still closed to the general public - was a clean sheet of ice. The fresh snow which the weatherman had predicted was all but non-existent and so I decided to shelve the idea of a ski for a better day when I could find good snow conditions.
Got to know this view quite well... hour in and an hour out!
As luck would have it the trail head has another good hike up to the neighbouring Seward range a cluster of 3 separate peaks. Still a long walk in but slightly less than to Seymour… and I was here already. So I changed plans, re-jigged my pack and headed off. The opening stanza includes the aforementioned closed access road. A 5 km stroll along the icy road to the summer trail head before the actual hike begins. That was quickly followed by 5 more km along an abandoned woods road before arriving at the start of the uphill travel on the range access trail. It quickly became clear I hadn’t anticipated all that the day would hold. Four short hours from the start I finally found myself on the Seward range and into winter in full force! While it had been quite pleasant down below (a warm -8C) the ridge was a few degrees cooler and a strong breeze was roaring overhead. For the most part the range trail is in the woods but occasionally it pops out to sweeping vistas of these remote mountains (and the full brunt of a winter wind!).
Arriving on the range!
The access trail drops you essentially on the middle peak of the range - Donaldson - with two peaks at either end - Emmons to the south and Seward to the North. This necessitates an out and back hike to each end of the ridge. While it’s only a kilometer or so to either end of the range, the narrow twisted path is a tough test with ups and downs to negotiate and cripple brush to press through. Winter hiking on these high peaks is often a game of continuously hiking forward doubled over ducking under (through?!) pine branches as they try and resist your forward progress. The summer trail is usually 1 meter down in the snow pack so winter progress puts you up in the "canopy" of the trees... and the canopy is seldom trimmed back for winter travel! A great core workout to be sure. On the plus side the hikes to each peak are relatively short so I ditched my full pack at the mid-point and took only some essentials with me as I forged my way to either end of the ridge. A lighter load was much appreciated and made for speedier progress.
Emmons always looks to be farther away... until you're finally there
The south end of the ridge was reached uneventfully and the return trip wasn’t too arduous. At that point the mental game creeps in and it can be tough to stay strong and go for the third peak… versus retreating downhill and coming back another day. “Just another km out (and back)” so I – perhaps foolishly – pressed on and made the much more technically tricky climb to Seward proper. The climb had a few more challenges including an icy chute to climb up (and back down later) and a few more feet of elevation to crest. As I approached the summit of Seward I found myself in a somewhat unexpected spot. The last few hundred meters, which I expected to be cut through the same cripple brush I’d been fighting all day(that's the way it was as I remembered it from summer travel) was suddenly above the tree tops thanks to a couple of meters of snow! This left me fully exposed to the artic wind which was raging at this point. Sweat soaked clothes quickly iced over and I dashed to and from the summit disk to get back to the relative protection of the trees. Seward made me earn the 3rd summit. For the next few minutes I ran up and down the last protected pitch to warm up and thereby thaw out my jacket which had become, in the brief moment in the wind, a frozen husk. Not a good spot to be some 5 hours from the car in a lonely part of the park. Still, I knew what had to be done and was soon thawed out. The trek back to the pack was no less tricky with that tough icy slope to down climb but soon enough I was ready to head back out.
The last look at the Range.... before the icy "chute" down
The walk out was pretty mindless though it had its own trials. The trail off the range descends moderately but seems to go on forever. At the bottom it was back onto the woods road and then the long road walk out to the winter car park. One foot in front of the other and ignore the ever louder voices in my head telling me "we've had enough fun, please stop walking!" Feet barking, body aching… and the car still “Just around the next bend”… which finally came true, but it took more than a few tries.
Keep enjoying the little things - sunlight through the trees - and maybe you won't notice the aches and pains...
Usually one of the true joys of a long hike in the woods is getting to the car and changing into dry clothes for the ride home. I know that sounds a little like the joy of hitting your hand with a hammer is the delightful pleasure when you stop... but it’s not the only joy for the hike. Sadly, when I got to the car I was somewhat robbed of that joy. After stowing my gear in the back and changing into a dry shirt my hands had frozen into blocks of ice. The car was running and I didn't have the desire (or energy) to do any running on the spot so I bolted into the car and headed off down the road. The remaining tasks of changing and packing the gear were undertaken over 4 or 5 stops every 20 miles or so as I rewarmed in the hot car and drove north bound. Boot off, drive, other boot off, drive some more, pack wet clothes out of the back seat, drive a few more miles, find and put on jacket, drive, find passport and some bridge toll money, drive... not ideal but it did break up the ride home. Hot shower at home finally warmed the core and I slept 10 or 11 hours. Out of curiosity I ran a few numbers on the hike when I got home - 33km and just shy of 4000ft on a remote mountain track. More than I had bargained for when I started the day but my Olympic hangover is gone for at least 2 more years. A set of pictures can be found
here.
Thanks for the fun Seward... I'll be back one day to visit your brother Seymour(just over on the right)
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