We enjoyed a fine blue-sky autumn day in the foothills with nary a cloud to be seen. Just west of Bragg Creek we had to stop briefly as a whitetail doe was slowly moseying across the road followed by three of her fawns, the fourth fawn uncertainly stayed on the other side of the road. It was +2 at the West Bragg parking lot to start but the sunshine provided a nice addition of solar heat. The trails were bare and dry for the most part and traction devices were not required. When we came to the junction at the start of the actual Merlin View loop, Ursula suggested we do it clockwise as the mountain bikers (there were many on this popular bike trail) generally do the loop in a counterclockwise direction. This was good advice as you can see them up ahead coming your way as opposed to them quickly approaching from behind.

As we neared the far end of the loop we came upon a group of cyclists dealing with a bad accident, one of them was lying on the ground in a lot of pain, subsequently reported as head and shoulder injuries. They had some extra clothing and a space blanket to cover him up, but not much in the way of a first aid kit. We were able to help out by providing some tylenol. We continued another 300 metres to the far end of the loop where we had our lunch break:

Group photo at Merlin View - Ron, Barbara, John & Ursula

While there, the rescue helicopter came by to pick up the injured cyclist. The area he was in was forested side-hill so they had to do some staging in an open cutblock in the valley below to set up a longline before returning to drop in the rescue personnel:


Dangling rescuer about to be deposited at injury site

They eventually hauled up a stretcher and took it to the West Bragg parking lot where it was reported he was transferred to STARS air ambulance. As we continued on the return loop we were a ways above the rescue site where we had a good view when the helicopter returned to pick up one of the rescue personnel using the longline:


Rescue chopper hovering in the wind

It had been a little cooler in the forest when a breeze started up but in open areas out of the wind it was quite warm. The recent invalid in our group found time to take a rest break:


Lady of Leisure at The Merlin Lounge

On the return we added some bonus distance and elevation gain via Reconnect & Long Distance trails, for a total of 14.6 km. Temperature was +10C when we finished.

Participants: Ron C/S/P thanks Ursula, Barbara and John for joining me on this enjoyable saunter.

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