Arriving at the trailhead there was light rain, snow among the trees and the summit of Mount Burke was in cloud. Some of us suggested switching to Raspberry ridge or Junction Hill aborting the planned North peak - Mount Burke loop. There was consensus to abort the loop but the group preference was to head up the Mount Burke trail. This ended up being a good choice as the rain stopped and the summit became free of cloud.

Mount Burke summit

We got to the summit on the good trail in just over two and half hours for lunch .


Ricardo, Bill, Arnold, Sim, John, Bruce, Carl, Inge and Jeannette summit Mount Burke

Not much snow where we were but further north peaks were quite white. 50cms of snow had been reported at Highwood pass.


Snowy peaks around upper Highwood valley after late June snowfall

The weather all around seemed unsettled - we could see various cells of wet weather - so we headed down.


Descending Mount Burke

Another short sprinkle of light rain as we got down below tree line but mostly we avoided any serious rain during the hike. This was not the case on our drive back to Calgary. West of Longview we ran into a thunderstorm and lightning with very heavy rain and though we did n't have hail there was hail on the road. Although I was a bit disappointed not doing the loop the storm confirmed, for me, that aborting it was the smart decision. The north peak loop would have been another couple of hours longer than our trip. Though the storm may have avoided Mount Burke the ridge would not have been a good place to be if it had not.

Thanks to participants: Sim,Bill,Arnold,Ricardo,Carl,Jeannette,Inge,John and Bruce for being flexible and agreeable to aborting the original plan. Thanks John for the photos.

Fauna: a small black bear on the drive back near Gunnery creek.