January 27, 2020, Goat Creek and Pond
Distance: approximately 14 kms
Elevation gain: none
On Monday, January 27, Fred and I headed into Kananaskis for a snowshoe. Our plan was to attempt the Fist east ridge. I had seen that another party of climbers had been successful gaining the ridge a couple of weeks ago and anytime a track has been set that you can follow increases chances of success and makes for a much easier day physically.
We left Calgary early in the hopes we might see a glorious sunrise along Highway 40. While there was some colour over Old Baldy ridge, it was quite minimal and uneventful. Oh well, given how often we are in the mountains, I am sure there will be another spectacular sunrise soon. The drive is beautiful as always and I particularly love it when we see very few other cars.
Once again, the weather people seemed to get it wrong. By the time we reached Engadine meadows across from the Fist, we could tell this area would be socked in with cloud for the day. What do we do – climb and likely have no views – or leave the Fist for another day and chase the sunshine? We opted for the latter. Having finally trekked up Ha Ling just under a week ago, we now knew there was a whole area we had never explored – the Goat Creek and Pond area – and so we continued down the Smith Dorien until we reached the parking lot just before the Canmore Hill.
We quickly loaded our backpacks and donned our snowshoes and headed down a trail on the left side of Goat Creek. After walking a for a bit, Fred shared he thought we were on the wrong trail and that this path would only take us a couple of kms at most. So back we went to the parking lot and then started again down what appeared to be the main trail. Laughing to ourselves because snowshoes were way too much on this path where we could almost have been in running shoes with no traction, we made quick work of the first km or so before we realized we were on our way to Banff 😆. Retracing our steps once again, we eventually found our way to the correct trail. What we came to realize is there area a ton of trails in this area and other than continuing to Banff, all those other paths we had been on likely would have got us to Goat Pond somehow.
We seemed to have had the whole area to ourselves except momentarily when two dog sleds went by. The scenery was beautiful. I particularly loved the views of East end of Rundle, Ha Ling and Miners Peak, and the ice along the creek. While I had hoped for a climb today, we did cover quite a bit of distance, and it was clear when looking down toward Spray Lakes that we were correct in thinking the Engadine meadows area would be socked in with heavy cloud.
For sure I want to come back to this area and either cross country ski or bike to Banff (38 kms return).
