On Saturday we climbed Sunwapta Peak in Jasper National Park. It was an early start as we were hiking by 7:30am. The trail as you leave the Icefields Parkway climbs steeply up the south watershed through the mosquito-infested forest. There is a beautiful canyon with some interesting rock formations as one follows the trail to the north of the creek. When we broke out of the trees we were greeted with scree with snowy patches that stretched up into the cloudy abyss. Shortly, all the scree was covered with snow. From there it was one foot after the other. Often the only sounds were the crunch of boot on snow, the metallic clink of the ice axe and our own laboured breath. The last few hundred meters were near white-out as the cloud had meshed neatly with the snow.My eyes played tricks on me as I squinted into the flat white. Swirls and spots appeared in the whiteness, a rock blinked red like an avalanche beacon, and distances that were only a few meters seemed immensely further. When we finally reached the summit, due to the rarified air, it took us a moment to collectively decide whether it was indeed the place!
"Is this the summit?"
"Well, there is a pile of rocks and it slopes down on this side."
"It slopes on this side too!"
"This must be it then."
"Woo!!"
"Yeah! Woohoo!"
"Woo!"
On the way down we were glad for the snow as we awoke our inner otter and slid down most the mountain on our bottoms! We used the ice axes as both rudders and stopping devices. I believe the mountaineers term is glissade but I call it fun! We really noticed the oxygen difference when we dropped altitude rapidly by sliding. After a quick bath in the runoff stream we stumbled back to the car, weary, sunburnt, sore and grinning.
