An absolutely Golden Day!
Golden larches against the dark green spruce and firs.
Golden sunshine peering around and over the peaks.
Golden larches highlighted against the brillant blue of Lake O'Hara and the greens of Opabin and other lakes.
Golden (well maybe yellow) buses to transport us to and from the wonderful environs of Lake O'Hara.
Golden larches offset aginst a few patches of last weeks snow.
A Golden opportunity taken to do one of the most spectacular trail hikes in the Canadian Rockies.


Larches on the Alpine Circuit

Ivan, Kim and I had done the O'Hara Alpine Circuit in June in the clockwise direction described in the guidebooks, so I elected to call the trip in reverse. The difference with doing this in September is that the meeting and return at Assumption happen in darkness (assuming that one uses the 8:30 bus into Lake O'Hara and returns via the 6:30 bus out.) The bonus of that was however that even the drive to the mountains with the sun rising from behind us, and the drive home with the sun setting were glorious.

We set off at 9:00 via the Big Larch Trail to the steep climb up to All Soul's Prospect on the north ridge of Mt Schaeffer. Within half an hour we were above the tree line and after about an hour we arrived at the fantastic viewpoint. While we took in the views and played around on the rock just above the prospect, a party of two travelled through, presumably on their way to the summit.

At All Soul's Prospect

The descent to the Opabin Plateau crossed some snow left over from the storms of ten days earlier. But is was soft and did not really have any effect. Once down on the Opabin West trail we began to see quite a few other groups. Other than there, we met only a few people. We stopped for lunch at the rocky promontory above the east side of Opabin Lake. There we admired a remarkable spider-shaped crevasse on the Opabin Glacier (with boot/snowshoe tracks right up to the left of it.)


Spider Crevasse on Opabin Glacier

Before proceeding around the Yukness Ledge, we took a side trip up to the Sleeping Poet Pool on the side of Mt Yukness.



Resting Coordinators Puddle

All talk of the of poetry got us thinking and we (well mainly Ginger), came up with the following on the drive home.

One day in the fall we went rambling
We had no intention of scrambling
Twas hard to ignore
The pose of the four
Who up Schaeffer's backside went ambling

At Sleeping Poet Pool, said Von Mirbach
We'll stop and get rid of our backpack
We thought it was cool
To sit by the pool
And a mermaid we spied on the rock

Then it was onward to more fantastic views along the Yukness Ledge.

Three Old Men - Three Young Ladies

Two decided to return down the Oesa Lake trail in order to catch the 4:30 bus, the rest of us completed the circuit to Oesa Lake (cool in the shade at 3 pm) and up the Huber Ledges to Wiwaxy Gap (cool in the afternoon breeze).


Ginger on Huber Ledges

On the way down from Wiwaxy Gap, I commented that it was too bad that we hadn't seen any wildlife other than several pikas. Minutes later we saw a Rocky Mountain goat, but he was a good way off. We were back at Le Relais waiting for the bus shortly after 5:30.

Distance: about 13 km, total elevation gain: about 900 m, temperature: about 12, but pleasantly warm in the sun, weather: spectacular.

Thanks to Ivan for mentoring me for the second time, participants: Ginger, Kim, Lorri, Ken, and Carl (coordinator and scribe)

PS We discussed which direction was better, Ivan thinks clockwise, I think counterclockwise, but we managed to agree that it is great either way.

Giants at Sleeping Poet Pool!