Sufferfest Day 4 - Achilles Day

Achilles Day  Hiking Day? Rest Day?

It had been raining all night and was still raining when I checked at 6am, so Achilles was scrapped. Not only is it not fun to climb in the rain/when it's wet, it's very dangerous and we didn't need to climb, so we went back to bed.

Around 8am I got up and went to make tea and we lazed about, catching up on journalling, waiting for it to warm up a bit and discussing plans/options for the day.

After a couple of hours of dawdling around we were packed up and headed out for the Helen Lake hike, about 9km up the road, and a way to get into the alpine. Heading up on the bikes we saw fresh snow on a bunch of the mountains, including Hector and its neighbour, Andromache, which Achilles Spire climbs. We decided, though it had stopped raining, that today would have been a very cold day to climb Achilles and that we had made the right decision.

Pulling into the trailhead of the hike around 1pm, we found it relatively full of vehicles. The trail was obviously well used, with tonnes of exposed roots evident across its more than 1m width as it rose up We locked the bikes to a convenient tree a little way up the trail and then began the hike.

Our bikes locked to a tree.

Roots exposed by traffic on the trail; we prepare to head up.

Perhaps a scarlet Tanager?

The first 3km rose pretty steadily through the trees, offering better and better views of the Crowfoot Glacier, Crowfoot pass, and Bow Peak opposite, and then Hector and Andromache and others to the Southeast. As we rose through the trees we also saw evidence of forest fires past, and avalanche debris creating space on the slope for all the wildflowers to spring to life, with paintbrush and fireweed especially standing out.

Views of the Crowfoot Glacier.

Walking through a section that had been burnt in a fire.

Mounts Andromache (left) and Hector (right).

At the 3rd km, the trail wound back to the left/West, curling behind the peak towards Helen Lake, giving us stunning views of the broken Dolomite Peak, and the back side of the "Helen Shoulder" of Cirque Peak. This shoulder was similarly broken as Dolomite Peak, with a very large boulder field from rock slides, and signs of a recent slide from one of the walls.

Dolomite Peak

Helen Shoulder

Golden and pink columbine

Alpine stream to be crossed

Signs of (relatively) fresh rock slide on Helen Shoulder.

The trail here continues at a fairly level elevation to true alpine hills that we ascended to Lake Helen, where we grabbed a quick lunch before turning around and beginning the return journey, far more bundled up for having stopped.

Helen Lake

Dolomite Peak with sun on the fresh snow, with dark clouds menacing.

Large marmot.

Another view of the Crowfoot Glacier.

By the time we got back to the bikes we had warmed up again, in time to ride downhill the 9km to the hostel, where we dined on leftover chili and rehydrated stew, started our breakfasts soaking, and generally depleted our camping food supplies to almost nothing. My bag should be far lighter tomorrow as we ride down to Banff via Lake Louise, hopefully climbing in the former,.

For now, we're relaxing by the fire in the common area of the Mosquito Creek hostel before checking weather, doing a bit of packing, and going to bed.

Woodstove in the hostel.