It was raining on the drive to the Red Deer Lake carpool location, but not another drop until we returned to Calgary when we encountered light showers again. We had sunny skies, cool temperatures and some wind at times on the ridge, but not terribly strong.

Our amiable group enjoyed a hike that was new to all but the coordinator, with no other people around (there was one lone hiker who left the parking lot before us, but we never saw him again). Two of our group were on their first Rambler's hike.

Heading down the farm road from the parking area, we turned right, just before the fence and headed along the bank of the creek, then into the woods and turned uphill to the gate accessing large meadows. After promoting this as a "flower hike" I was disappointed in the sparsity of flowers in the grassy hill that is the approach to the Little Whaleback ridge, but once we gained that ridge (about 2.5 km into the hike) we were treated to a wide array of beautiful flowers, including many that were unfamiliar to many of us - luckily we had Bill along to help identify these. The views were great from the ridge which goes on for many 'bumps'....we stopped at one of the higher ones about 6km from the parking lot, but there was still a bit of ridge left to explore had we chosen to continue.

Balsamroot and ridge view

Nuttall's Rockcress

Moss Phlox

Hooker's Townsendia

At top of (our) final hill on the ridge

Only one tick was seen - on David's pant leg during the hike. We did a tick check before getting into our cars and no additional critters were discovered.

Full group, minus photographer (Bill)

Thanks to a great group to enjoy this beautiful hike with: Bill, Aldis, Lenard, Carolyn, David, Keith including Evelyn and Jean on their first Ramblers' hike, from coordinator Barb. Special thanks to Bill for many of the photos and flower identification.