Sunday, September 28, Mr. GeoK ascended Snow Peak in the company of Sleepy_hollow, RedRouge, reastick and BVPete. As planned, the intrepid hikers hit the trail about 8:30, enjoying a quiet walk past Burstall Lakes, through the forest and on to the stony, watery upper valley floor. This time of year there isn’t much running surface water to contend with.
A short while later, most of the group made a quick stop to find our GCYE40 Fav. Hike #5 – Burstall Pass geocache before pushing on to ascend Snow Peak, which is just inside the boundary of Banff National Park. Mr. GeoK spotted several karst openings enroute, including one that was so deep it took 12 seconds for a dropped rock to hit bottom! There was some snow accumulation on the Peak, but not enough to warrant crampons or event gaiters. After signing the summit log, the crew descended to a snow free area to enjoy lunch before heading back to the parking area. Return hiking time was about 6.5 hours, distance was 20 km with an elevation gain just over 800 meters. Snow Peak is rated an easy scramble in Andrew Nugara’s "More Scrambles in the Canadian Rockies" and also has one of the shortest hiking times of all the easy scrambles. For anyone toying with the idea of giving scrambling a try, this would be a good first outing – great scenery and very manageable terrain.
