New Tooth Day

Wed 7th Sept. The tooth fairy came today for Doug and removed his old broken tooth and replaced it not with coins but a metal pin, and a new temporary tooth on a mouth shield. And since he was a big boy and didn't need me to hold his hand during the operation, I decided to climb another mountain. And I can officially say my love affair with mountains is over, after today's one. There are two prominent peaks on Banff's doorstep, Cascade Mountain (2998 m) which we climb yesterday, and Rundle Mountain (2949 m) which I tackled today. I walked from Tunnel Mountain Campground to the trailhead, by Banff's golf course, 6 kms and 1 hour. The lower part of the trail was fine, a steady climb through forest, and then switchbacks, and then a horizontal traverse until reaching a rocky gully. After that, the hiking track ends and the scrambling starts. Firstly very steeply through forest, which was still okay but then comes the "Dragon's Back" - a sloping spine of limestone bedrock covered in loose gravel between two gullies. To make it worst, it was really windy and at times the gusts nearly blew me off my feet - I did consider turning around, but decided I would keep going as long as the other couple of guys who was scrambling up by me kept going. It was really tough going, and took me 1 hr to cover 1 km. I eventually got to the top, however the wind was even worst, it was freezing and there was even some hail. I really did not feel safe up there, and there was no one else around, so after a few quick photos started heading down. I do not enjoy going down on scree, especially when there is lots of other rocks etc with it, so it was again very slow going, 45 mins to do 1 km - I think it's times like this hiking poles would be useful. Once of the Dragon's Back, the rest of the hike was fine, and amazing how different the weather is as you get lower, it was soon back to just singlet. Hike stats: 14.38 km, active time 6 hrs 34, elevation gain 1711 m. Then it was the 1 hour walk back to the campground, to find a sore Doug. Operation to remove tooth and insert the pin was successful but pretty painful once the anesthetic wore off, so he had a quite afternoon. Steps D 10483 / V 44496Leer más