Day 25, September 6

Day 25, September 6 — It's a small world

Locations: Mt. Edith Cavell; Maligne Lake

Miles driven: 96

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I got up at 7:15 which was a few minutes later than I wanted, but it was tough getting up after the late night last night. I looked out the window and saw the tip of Cavell was already receiving pink light. DANG! I hurried as fast as I could and walked down to the bridge. Dang it again! There were already two other photographers shooting, and in the spot I wanted to be. I would much rather be the only one here, and now I have to invade their space. I knew I would have to set up right next to them, and even then, I don’t know if the composition would work. It wasn’t bad at all as it turns out, but I preferred to be a few more feet to the left. As I passed by them, we exchanged good mornings. I got set up and started to shoot. It wasn’t until after I set up my 4x5 that any conversation started. The camera got his attention and the guy said, “Nice camera.” We began to talk. The guy’s name was Bret and his wife’s name is Libby. They drove out from Vancouver Island, where they have been for 25 years, to visit their son in Canmore, just outside of Banff. She was shooting 35mm and he was shooting 6x7. He was wanting to get into 4x5 at some point, so I let him check out my camera and look through the ground glass at the mountain in front of us. He absolutely loved it. The irony of all of this, as it turns out, is that he was raised in my home town of Aurora! No way! He went to Hinkley High (I attended Overland) and asked if it was still there (it is). He said he imagined the town has grown and that Hinkley used to be on the far eastern edge of Aurora. I told him that it basically lies in mid-Aurora nowadays. He couldn’t believe it. He left Colorado in 1965. Libby went to Western State in Gunnison. I handed them my web site business card, but unfortunately have not heard from them yet.

After shooting at Cavell Lake, and getting virtually identical shots as yesterday morning, I drove the last bit of road to the big trailhead parking lot at the end. I walked to the meltwater lake at the base of Cavell Glacier and took a number of shots here. I then decided to hike up the boulder slope on the eastern side of the lake to get more of an aerial view of the lake. I was also looking to the valley over the ridge to the south and really wanted to see what the view was like from the ridge. So, I took the Cavell Meadows trail which was lies just on the other side of the hill I just climbed up. Well, once atop the ridge, which took longer than anticipated to reach, the views weren’t really good, so I continued on towards the end of the trail and got to the lower overlook. I rested for a bit and enjoyed the view. I really wanted to go to the end of the trail to the upper overlook, but I was already running low on energy and wasn’t sure I could make it. I had four granola bars before I left the parking lot, but didn’t have any packed in the bag and I only had a small bottle of water with me that was maybe about half full at this point. I was only counting on going to the meltwater lake when I left. I went up the trail a little further and decided to head back down. Well, I changed my mind as I really wanted to get to the top, and who knows how long it would be before I come up here again—not to mention getting a blue sky day to do this! I finally made it to the top, step after tired, exhausted step. The views at the top weren’t really any greater than from the point at the bottom of the final pitch, but obviously you don’t find that out until getting there.

On the way back down from the final pitch, I met a retired couple from San Diego. We walked and conversed for most of the way back down as my legs were quickly turning to Jell-O. They had been in this region since early June. The weather I had been experiencing, other than this absolutely clear day, of course, was what they said it had been like the whole time they had been here. Along the way at one point, we heard huge chucks of ice calving off of Angel Glacier and crashing below somewhere. It sounded like thunder, though we never saw the lightning. Apparently, this can be heard pretty frequently here, but this was the only time I had heard it today. The couple indicated that the next two days were supposed to be back to cloudy skies. Perfect! Just the news I wanted to hear! I finally made it back down to the parking lot at 4:25 and I was beat from the 7.5k hike. I was ready to get the boots off. I scarfed down five or six granola bars as I had been running on empty for some time. Oh man, it was nice to sit down!

As soon as I gained some energy back, I made my way over to Maligne Lake for sunset. I changed 10 film holders in the lot at the lake, then walked down the trail along the eastern shore to the open spot I scouted out previously. I arrived at the point at 6:40 and waited for the sun to make its way down. There had been one really small cloud when I first arrived that was above the mountains to the south, but it didn’t last long. Sunset was totally clear. So, I get either all gray, or all blue! Well, last night was the exception. At this point, I would take totally clear days from this day on.

After sunset, I walked back and fixed up another batch of tortellini and I left the parking lot at 9:15. At southern end of Medicine Lake at 9:28, I saw a tail end of black bear #9 heading off the side of the road. Tonight, I would stay at the end of the Moab Lake Road since it serves as a trailhead for Athabasca Pass, so I figured this should be another safe bet for camping. I arrived here at 10:24 and the skies remained clear.

~7:23 AM — Mt. Edith Cavell receives the first light of the day