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Rocky Mountain Ramblers Association

Trip Report
Trip Date:
9-Jun-2020
Activity:
Off-Trail hike
Trip name:
Missinglink Mountain Loop
Coordinator:
Brian
Report:

Three of us left the Bighorn Parking Lot heading directly NW up the sparsely treed hillside to the south ridge of Missinglink mountain with amazing views under bright blue skies.




Heading up the ridge with Shunga La She in the background (photo courtesy Philip)

Once on top the next 2 km heading west are very pleasant.




Philip on the open ridge




Rosanne on the south ridge

At the west end, the trail drops down more northward and crosses a cutline.




Interesting tree

After that, the trail peters out and the route heads gently up to the summit proper with expansive views to the west and north. This is the usual turn-around point for most parties but we continued around clockwise to visit 3 more peaks.




View of Bluerock Mountain from north ridge

Annoying Alders started to appear, making previous trail remnants harder to follow, though not too bad.




Cluster of Calypso Orchids

Around the fourth and final top is a proliferation of matchstick pines forming a kind of maze that's almost fun to go through. We followed the NE ridge down to the valley bottom with a creek and meadows.




Abundant Shooting Stars (photo courtesy Philip)

Heading east now, we occasionally encountered boggy areas that didn't last very long. The biggest surprise of the day was spotting a black bear directly ahead of us, munching in the meadow.




Rosanne walking towards an unexpected surprise (photo courtesy Philip)




Black bear in the meadow

When it noticed us, it ran off into the trees, allowing us to continue on our way.




Creek crossing

After a couple more easy creek crossings, we headed south and came to the highway, less than 1/2 km from our cars.

We all appreciated the variety of classic foothills terrain.

Participants: Rosanne,Philip, andBrian, trip Coordinator.