Jun 11, 2017
Wanted to connect a big loop today and it looked like I was going to have nice weather - ha. It took me 3hrs to get from the Elfin Lakes trail head to the Elfin Hut - the snow line was what I've been seeing everywhere 1100m. I was a little uneasy traveling alone all day after seeing a giant black bear first thing in the morning and getting growled at from a tree by something else (cougar perhaps). After a bite to eat at the hut I made my way to the Columnar / Gargoyles col. The snow was isothermic and wet and cornices hung so high I pretty much had to summit the Gargoyles to find a suitable way down. After that, the weather moved in and I was felt completely disorientated with no visual reference points for a while. I had to keep looking back but at some point it didn't matter. It was white literally everywhere with no sight line - it feels entirely unnatural and you're grasping for anything to give you a clue. I kept moving up slowly and surely and then finally saw dark stone, a bit of melted ridge. I hugged that thing like a life line up and down, it was the only thing saving me from a white abyss. The last 200m to the Little Diamond head summit were snow free and it was a sandy, rocky, fall-apart texture. I couldn't see anything except that I was on a knife ridge with a drop offs on either side. I didn't exactly want to linger and there was an unknown route ahead of me to figure out. So I hugged the line making sure not to go too close in case of the cornices and descended towards what I thought was Alice Ridge. The snow was soft and moving was fine in the upper alpine although navigation was tough in the white out. I followed the natural terrain down and right until finally I could see Squamish far below. I was at least heading towards civilization! Before me I could see a logging road, I just had to get to it. A bit more contouring, a couple creek ravines, some tree weaving back and forth and eventually I got to my road. It was NOT the paradise I had hoped for. Instead I was met by an alter grove of spring loaded trees which made bashing through exhausting and slow moving. Finally things opened up to a road which I could tell at some point had been skied. I descended and sure enough at 1100m I was back on rock. Bears seem to use this road, I saw lots of droppings. The road keeps going and going and going and going and going. After 30km, I was ready for it to be over and so were my very wet feet. In the lower aspects I was happy to start seeing some of the mountain biking trails and signs of other people :) Job done! For the record I think Alice ridge is more work than the Elfin Lakes route.
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