Exshaw Ridge Off-Trail hike on 10-May-2025

I have to admit: I don't love this hike, because it takes a long time to get to the really good part. But it's not far from Calgary, dries out early and was likely to be quiet, so off we went, and as expected the excellent company made the day a lot of fun.

We followed a good route to gain the ridge after an hour of climbing, and from there enjoyed increasingly good views and walking on rock fins until finally coming to the "really good part" after another 80 minutes or so. The ridge becomes extremely beautiful after this point, although we decided to stop for lunch after another 50 minutes to avoid a significant downclimb... and because the spot had lots of snow that we could sit on to minimize the number of ticks joining us for lunch. We saw (and heard) 2 CF-18s fly high overhead during lunch.

The journey back was fun on the ridge and then swift on a more direct dirt descent route. 16 km, 1050m, 6.75 hours. Thanks to everyone for a great day!

Speaking of ticks... we picked several off during the hike, and then more back at the cars. By this point we were all a bit tick-paranoid, so stripped off our shirts to check each other's torsos. The people in the Legion probably enjoyed the show. :) Then the carpoolers found another one just after we started driving, so had to dispatch it outside (Deb, our carpool driver, displayed an impressive amount of calm in pulling over).

Participants: Sim, Sharon, Vi, Ingrid (coordinator), Margot, Deborah, Tatyana, Tina, Neil, Pati