Snowshoe trip between two debriefs:
What a day! When we met at Superstore it was raining very hard, so we decided to go to Timmy's for a coffee to see if it would clear up. Lo and behold, the weather apps were showing better conditions on the mountain, so we headed up to Raven lodge. With snow falling and a cool breeze in our faces, we started up Great Big View. Five minutes later the sun came out as we were going up, up, up the hill. Did I say we were going up? With soft snow, tree wells here and there, and a steady climb, we had to pay attention to our footing. Once we conquered the first big hill we stopped for our lunch/snack break. Quite the view! As one of our members said,”Looks like ants on skis down there”. We then continued onto the Finger Glades trail, which included another steady climb through the trees (where we got rained on from the melting snow) to the top of the trail. The rest of the trip was all downhill, which was truly a blessing, as we were certainly feeling the effects of an estimated 200 metre elevation gain. Finally, it was back to the Lodge for our second debrief and the usual chatter about how wonderful it was to accomplish this trip. To cap off a great adventure we saw a heard of elk in the forest beside the road near the bottom of Strathcona Parkway.
Thanks to Bill Jorgensen for the photos. To see all of Bill's photos click here.
What a day! When we met at Superstore it was raining very hard, so we decided to go to Timmy's for a coffee to see if it would clear up. Lo and behold, the weather apps were showing better conditions on the mountain, so we headed up to Raven lodge. With snow falling and a cool breeze in our faces, we started up Great Big View. Five minutes later the sun came out as we were going up, up, up the hill. Did I say we were going up? With soft snow, tree wells here and there, and a steady climb, we had to pay attention to our footing. Once we conquered the first big hill we stopped for our lunch/snack break. Quite the view! As one of our members said,”Looks like ants on skis down there”. We then continued onto the Finger Glades trail, which included another steady climb through the trees (where we got rained on from the melting snow) to the top of the trail. The rest of the trip was all downhill, which was truly a blessing, as we were certainly feeling the effects of an estimated 200 metre elevation gain. Finally, it was back to the Lodge for our second debrief and the usual chatter about how wonderful it was to accomplish this trip. To cap off a great adventure we saw a heard of elk in the forest beside the road near the bottom of Strathcona Parkway.
Thanks to Bill Jorgensen for the photos. To see all of Bill's photos click here.