Waterton

Sat 17th Sept. Finally get to finish the triple crown challenge, with a hike National Geographic rates as one of the World's 20 most thrilling Trails - Crypt Lake. And it was an absolutely beautiful day to do it too, after an extremely windy night, woke up to a blue sky and sun and very little wind and more importantly very little smoke haze. Firstly have to take a 15 min boat ride, leaving the wharf at 9 am, when we got there at 8.30 there was already lots of hikers, so many they decided to do 2 trips, (heard they actually ended up doing 3 trips) so we got on the first boat of 48 passengers at 8.45. And because we hate hiking in a procession, quickly got off the boat and on the trail. It was a fairly gentle climb up most of the way. And then about 2/3s of the way as we were going around a switchback corner we heard a bit of a rock fall, looking over to the right on a rocky hillside next to a waterfall, we saw a brown bear and then further down the hill a larger whiter bear - mama grizzly and cub - so exciting watching mama get back to her baby who was busy digging causing loose rocks to go tumbling. We then carried on up to the exciting bit of the hike - the ledge, ladder and tunnel. The ledge is a narrow exposed path that leads to a 3 m ladder, which takes you to the 20m tunnel through the rock and out to another narrow ledge which has a cable to help you along. Then it is just a short way to the pristine alpine lake - Crypt Lake at 1980 m, that apparently has icebergs in until July and the fourth and most difficult challenge if you dare, a bomb into the deep blue water of the ledge of the trail that circumnavigates the lake. I don't know if it was because I did a bomb and went a lot lower than I have in other lakes but it was absolutely freezing and a little bit of panic going deep in such cold water. It was then time to head back down through the tunnel, ladder and ledge taking the detour near the bottom to go via Hell Roaring Falls, and although we were warned there wasn't much water flowing down it was still very pretty especially with the upper Waterton Lake in the background. We arrived at the jetty about 3.15 pm and at 3.45pm the ferry came for its first pickup. Hike stats: 20.52km, active time 5 hrs, elevation gain 1127 m. With the sun shining and feeling wonderful after our week in Waterton stopped at the liquor store and found the nearest things so far to Black Russians - Joe Stiffs (vodka, coffee and cola) not as good but still went down with BBQ chips while I wrote this. Then into the village for pizza. Was going to a talk up at the Prince of Wales Hotel but after finishing the pizza only had 8 minutes to get up there so gave it a miss. Steps D / V 37180Read more