It’s that first glimpse. It gets me every. single. time.
When I’m driving down the humdrum Hwy 2 when suddenly the Canadian Rocky Mountains appears on the horizon. It’s enough to take your breath away. Truly.
Damn. Mother Nature is good.
On Friday, I decided to tackle Mount Lady MacDonald trail. It didn’t look too difficult or a long hike. I saw some pictures online and the barren rocks intrigued me. I love rocks. I love scrambles. The directions to the trailhead were not that clear (for me anyway). I don’t know the area so it was slightly confusing.
There were a bunch of guys who were working on the Cougar Creek bank restoration project. (The creek and area was damaged during last year’s floods). I asked them which way to go and they pointed at a hole in this fence and explained the trailhead was along the river.
Oh they were so wrong. I followed on the riverbed for about half an hour until I gave my head a shake. I was clearly going in the wrong direction. Sigh. So I turned around and eventually found the trailhead. It was not far from where the guys were working. During my little adventure, I miscalculated a jump and landed right in the river. I also cut my leg on a few rocks.
Anyway .. back to the trail. My feet were soaked but I refused to go back to my car to look for dry socks. I thought my sneakers were wet so what was the point? And up, up, up I went. And I went. I enjoyed a nice forested trail for a good while. It was very quiet. Almost spooky.
I had no idea whether or not I was going in the right direction. I just kept climbing. Eventually I ran into a couple who told me to follow their footsteps. (The higher I got, the more snow I came across.)
I stopped at a few viewpoints to take a few pics and to breath in the mountain air. The higher I climbed, the colder and windier it got but I didn’t mind the change in weather. What I did mind was going off track. Grr. I don’t know how I managed to do it but I totally bypassed the actual trail and scaled this very rocky bit. The wind was so strong that I thought I was going to be blown over the mountain top.
Eventually I spotted a trail marker as I was climbing up the rock face. I considered heading down because my hands and feet were super cold. But I kept climbing up the rocky trail for another good bit.
Like I said it was getting pretty windy so I took shelter behind a big rock. I started up this trail (which I think was the actual trail) and my left foot got caught on a slippery bit of rock and I went tumbling backwards onto a rock. Ugh. I wasn’t hurt or anything. I managed to catch myself before I actually fell.
It was then I decided I had enough and turned around. I checked my Garmin. I must have been very close to the summit. But at this point I was getting annoyed at myself. Time to call it a day!
Thanks to a couple of women that I passed on the way down, I found a safer way down from the rocks. (I can be such a moron sometimes!)
By the time I reached my car I was done being annoyed with myself. (One should never be annoyed in nature.) It was a beautiful day to be alive and in the mountains.
Looks like a beautiful spot to run!
It so is. Makes me want to pitch a tent and live here forever.
I get so jealous of your beautiful trail photos. We have nothing like that in New Brunswick!
Oh but NB is a nice scenic place with lovely people 🙂
Such a beautiful spot to be!
Indeed. I want to live there 🙂
You know how to find the best adventures, Crystal. The gorgeous views and photos to prove it make it worth it every time.
Wow, some pretty incredible views up there! Sorry to hear you got lost and had such a close encounter with the rocks!