Two days ago we thought it would be our last warm weather hike of the year--but today we were granted yet another chance, with a warm hike to Eagle Hill via Seventy Buck Valley.

We met at the Sibbald Lake day use area, before driving 5 km west to our trailhead. The sloping parking lot was a sheet of incredibly slippery ice, so just to touch bases with the group or use the facilities, (with our spikes in the back of the vehicle) we had to carefully inch our way around the lot, holding onto cars every bit of the way. This qualifies the parking lot experience as Scramble 5!

At our final destination we headed up the trail for 200 metres, by which time it was clear spikes would be required for the duration. The ice and frozen snow was soft enough that it was an easy walk, and we made a soft crunch, rather than the crackle-pop the spikes make on hard ice.

The legend of Seventy Buck Valley holds that early 20th century cowboys Percy Copithorne and Ken Kumlin were wandering the valley in search of strays--at this time of year with similar conditions, when poor old Percy lost his wallet, containing $70. Now back then, Percy surely felt the loss of $70 to be a financial blow from which it would take a while to recover. Today, however, with a century of inflation, if we had found the wallet, and the $70 was not totally disintegrated, it would just barely buy gasoline for the five of us for the trip!

First view of Eagle Hill from $70 Valley

This trail is a more direct route to Eagle Ridge, so, right at the junction with the main trail coming from Sibbald Lake, we met the group of Shell Oiltimers retirees who had left the parking lot just five minutes ahead of us.

We posed for a group shot at the summit and had lunch in almost calm, mild conditions. During lunch an eagle soared right through the gap beside Eagle Hill. It was 5 degrees at the start and 7 at the finish, at 1:30.

Darlene, Doug, Christine, Ivan on Eagle Hill

Participants: Christine,Carl, coordinator and scribe, Darlene,Ivan, and Douglas.

Thanks to Gillean Daffern for the historical story.