journey east: day 8

This entry marks the last full day of our trip to Yoho and my last full day in British Columbia. Reading back through the journal I couldn't have asked for this day to have started in a better place. Yoho seems to be a fairly small park when compared to its more glorified sister mountain-parks like Banff and Jasper, but it packs quite a bit of punch into its small area. Lake O'Hara is just one of the places in the park that stands out, regardless of the season.

June 9, 2006

I made it through the night in the hut quite nicely, although it was probably the most fitful night yet. The fire burned through the night and during moments of sleeplessness I would untuck myself from the deliciously warm and cozy confines of my sleeping bag and throw as large a piece of wood on the fire as the little stove could handle.

Part of my sleeplessness stemmed from the knowledge I was bedding down in what is essentially a kitchen. Sure it hasn't been used much in the past few months, but do the bears know that?

I prefer sleeping in a tent to sleeping in the open. My understanding of bears and tents is that bears are confused by tents. They just don't get them and for the most part leave them alone. In the cooking shelter, and I stress the cooking part of that, I was painfully aware that I was sleeping among scents of yummy. What I needed was an early warning system. There were shovels and other long handled tools about. I strategically placed them in the doorway of the shelter. It was my hope that should a hungry just awoken from a long winter nap grizzly happen upon me I would have enough time to wake up for the dining experience as it blundered through my nest of tools. And I slept with a can of bear spray under my pillow.

We tried to hike to Lake Opabin this morning, but snow at Opabin Plateau kept us from getting more than half a kilometre from the lake. The hiking today was wet. It was a fine drizzle that didn't really seem to fall. It just lingered in the air soaking everything that passed through it. The rain from last night made the remaining snow cornices heavy and we were treated to an avalanche on our journey back to the campsite. The whole time we were in the area no more than ten minutes would pass without the hearing the crack and roar of snow and ice tumbling down mountain faces. Low clouds kept us from seeing all but the one.

We hiked in silence for most of the morning. The area leading to Opabin Plateau deserved the silence. The sound of avalanches and ice falls constantly thundered through the valley. For the most part the action was hidden in a shroud of clouds. It wasn't until our hike that I realized the sounds I had heard in the night was that of avalanches. I thought all the rain had brought a thunder storm with it.

The higher we climbed and farther into the valley we hiked, the deeper and more impenetrable the snow became. Further limiting our progress was the amount of melt water run off forming pools and travelling in streams hidden beneath the snow. The dominant tree in the area was the Larch. Their needles turned orange littered the snow beneath their branches. It was a beautiful display of colour in such a monochrome landscape.

We visited the Alpine Club of Canada hut at O'Hara. We were greeted by a not-so-shy marmot and a couple of whiskey-jacks. I'd like to come back at this time of year again to take pictures. The Opabin Plateau was beautiful. btw - Oesa is Sioux for ice: a fitting name considering its namesake lake we visited yesterday was mostly covered in it.

Like the hike up, the hike back down to the parking lot was uneventful. Between the kilometre two and kilometre one distance markers I counted paces. 1,111. Unbeknownst to me Greg did the same thing for the last kilometre, but stopped when he reached 1,000. He figures he was a couple hundred metres shy of the parking lot. That's what boredom does to you.

When we got to the bottom - I was there first - I propped my bag on the narrow shelf of a sheltered information kiosk and leaned my hiking pole beneath it. I had to pee. As I walked back to the kiosk my bag leapt from the shelf and crushed my hiking pole. It was bent two-thirds of the way down. Damn. I guess I need to get a new pole.

Our final night at Kicking Horse, regrettably, was without a fire. Tired and cold after our day's journey we settled at a picnic table in one of the campground's shelters. We drank beer and played Yahtzee for most of the night. Despite the absence of a fire it was a delightful end to our tour of Yoho National Park. I couldn't have asked for more. Besides, I won four of nine games, rolled five Yahtzees, and managed a high score of 321. Yahoo.


Look at those scores. I throw my gauntlet down, for I am the Yahtzee King.

Tonight is the last night I will spend in British Columbia for a long time to come. It's not a night without regrets, though they are small. I move to Fredericton, on the whole, without regret. Meaghan and I have a future together that will be better served living in Fredericton than in Vancouver. However, there is so much of this province I have left unexplored. Likely 95 per cent of it. I guess I'll have to come back sometime.