Tom & I headed out for another hike on Saturday - it was weird not having Kali with us, but she's not quite up to it anymore with her bad elbows. We've been wanting to hike Mt. Fatty, a 7.6 km round-trip with 920m elevation gain (although our GPS recorded around 1100 m). The trail started with a brief foray into the woods, but with an instant hit of steady climbing.
This is the view from the lower slopes of Mt. Fatty back towards Upper Kananaskis Lake.
Out of the trees and up the rocky slope:
I paused here to take this pan:
Our first view of the peak of Mt. Indefatigable:
The Opal Ranges with Kananaskis Lake in the foreground.
At 2266 m we hit snow. Most of the trail wasn't too bad - compacted footprints made for decent footing and closer to the top the drifts had been blown away.
Tom making snow angels:
A snow-filled valley looking up to the peak of Mt. Fatty:
Getting close to the peak:
From this point we decided to take an impromptu ramble towards the northern outlier of Mt. Fatty. This is a view back down to where we came from.
A view of the wild flowers growing up the slope of the northern outlier:
A view of the northern outlier from Mt. Fatty:
A peek over the edge of Mt. Fatty:
Tom on a lower peak, but the highest we got to.
From the secondary peak up the ridgeline towards the real crest of Mt. Fatty - it was a bit more than Tom's hand could handle.
Tom suiting up to take the fast way down. If you strap a wind-breaker to yourself you can use it like a toboggan and slide down the snow (note to self: always pack wind-breaker on a trip like this!)
Tom getting the hiking poles ready for braking:
Tom en route:
Since I didn't have a wind-breaker with me I had to settle for boot-skiing down the snow.
Heading back down, and loving how beautiful the day was - great hike, great weather, and a beautifully lit fold =o)!
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