Saturday, May 16, 2009

Time To Forget Winter...

...but Forget-Me-Not Ridge is not quite ready to let us forget just yet! I started out in my short sleeve top, part way up I had to add a heavier long sleeve top and then the top toppers were hat, gloves and warm windbreaker jacket.

The temperature plummeted and the winds howled. Adventure Designer took this shot as I'm setting up for our summit shot. On a normal day three poles will make a tripod but for security reasons due to prevailing conditions, today we went with a sextpod!!! Check out the google map, it gives the lay of the land for today's trek. The gate to the playground in this neck of the woods just opened on May 14th and the masses swarmed in for the weekend. Thankfully not many were hikers like us.

With this sign in the sky, we felt safety was on our side. As much as I am tired of snow, I have to admit, the new white snow on the mountains against the vivid blue sky made for breathtaking beauty. Even horses and their riders, along with the family dog, came out to play today. The river is dry this time of year, just wait another month and it will be fast flowing with river rafters riding the flow. The bottom right photo in the foursome below shows how strong the wind was as it blows the snow over the edge.

There always seems to be something unique each and every time I head to the hills. You never know what you might do or experience or see. Like these trees! Rocks! Poles! What's next!

Due to conditions, we altered the plan of attack by adjusting the kilometer tally by a few and realizing we still accomplished a significant amout of elevation. As I said previously, safety was on our side today. We noticed Cornices lined the side of the mountains so stayed back from the edges.


Quite the profile displaying approximately 11.3 kms was covered in just over six hours. At the river bed we measured our elevation starting point to be 1617 meters (5305 feet) and at our summit we measured 2254 meters (7395 feet). In my opinion, 637 meters (2089 feet) of net elevation over a 4 km hike up the side of a mountain is nothing to sneeze at.


I'm so glad I decided to tag along with the eight fun folks today!


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