Dean Hebert Photography

 A last minute cancellation meant that I was solo hiking again! I called Jasper to change my resevations and the lady I was talking to said that I should be aware that there was a very high level of grizzly bear activity in the valley! Great!

 Tonquin Valley is renown for it's muddy trails and hordes of mosquitos but by the end of August I found the trails mostly dry and pretty much bug free.

 With what I thought was going to be a relatively easy 14 kms to Switchbac...

 Upon returning from Waterton Lakes, I was surprised to see that someone had replied to an ad I'd placed on clubtread. I'd been looking for someone to accompany me on a circuit tour of the Sawback Range in Banff National Park for almost 2 years. I sent off an email to James from Edmonton to see if he was still interested. He was, so we synced up our time off and made plans.

 On most of my trips so far I would drive to Golden and then spend the night there before heading to the...

 I've got this idea to visit all the national and provincial parks in the Canadian Rockies. So far, I've only been to Banff NP, and Assiniboine Provincial Park, but I'd found a good trip in Wateron, so I booked the time off and started another adventure.

 It's a long drive to Waterton so I spent a night in Cranbrook before arriving at the park gate the next day. I picked up my camping pass at the visitor centre and checked in at the warden cabin....

 I was looking for a backpacking trip this summer and when Clayton suggested Skoki, I quickly agreed.

 The plan was to hike to Hidden Lake the first day and then to Baker Lake on the second day, where we would set up base camp and explore the area.

 After the long drive from Chilliwack, hiking the access road was a tough chore, made slightly easier by some nice views back towards Lake Louise. We reached the ski lift area after 7 kms of roa...

 My original plan was to return to The Grand Canyon and The Valley of Fire so I figured October would be a good time, weather wise. Then I invited my sons to join me. Devin declined due to work, but Dalen said he would like to go. Only problem was he didn't have a passport. There was a hiccup in his application so with time running out we changed plans and decided to backpack to Mount Assiniboine.

 We left Chilliwack around 3:00 am and drove the 800 kms to the trail head at th...

 The sky looked promising when I crawled out of my sleeping bag at 6:00 am. I gathered my gear and walked over to the stream that flowed through the marsh. Except for the sound of the waterfall behind the campsite, the morning was quiet and still. I had been hoping that I would see some kind of animal, a deer, or elk, or even a moose, but it was just me standing in the middle of the field.

  I took lots of photos before the light changed and I called it quits.

  It rained intermittently overnight and I was reluctant to get out of bed. I caught up on my journal before getting ready to face the day. My body had a lot of aches and pains and I wasn't looking forward to the hike today.

  At breakfast the other campers were having a big discussion over where to go for everyone's day hike. I suggested mummy lake but I think they all had their minds set on whistling pass. I was going that way anyways so I said I would see them there.

  I'm going to jump to the end of the day. MUMMY LAKE!

  If you're hiking into Egypt Lake campground, there is only 1 destination, Mummy Lake. And don't scrimp out on the amount of time you budget, you'll want to spend all day at this alpine lake.

  In the morning, I awoke shortly after 5:00 am and headed to Shadow Lake to photograph the sunrise. There was a slight mist on the calm lake and a few clouds in the sky. Ball Mountain dominated the far end of the lak...

 I awoke at 5am and hatched a plan. After breakfast, I would hike back to the truck and get the TP that was in the glovebox, hike back to the campsite...

 After countless hours of dreaming about the Rockies, I decided to make the pigrimage. I tried to find someone to go with me but with no success. I decided to go solo.

 I had been reading a trail guide and scoping out the area on google earth and one of the most intriguing hikes was around Shadow Lake and the Egypt Lakes area. I saw a way of making a loop that would allow me to hike out right where I went in with only a few kilometers of ove...