Autumn Adventure in the Canadian Rockies
The annual trip with our friends from New Zealand is back for the fourth year in a row - this year, with a new addition - Mega Tent! Zach and McCall purchased a 6 person standard car camping tent and the 6 of us decided that it would be the perfect tent for our autumn backpacking trip in Canada. In the weeks leading up to our early October trip we started to get concerned about snow. The temperatures were looking cold and we knew that early October in the Canadian Rockies could very well feel like autumn or winter. Sadly, in those few weeks Nate injured himself and had to step back from this years trip. The 10+ mile days in uncertain weather conditions wasn’t sitting well for a hamstring injury. As the trip neared, the forecast started to look temperate and sunny - about all we could hope for in early October! Or so we thought - in an extra lucky sequence of events, it turns out we had timed the fall colors perfectly. The larches were all yellow and the bushes all were donning bright full colors.
The five of us met up in Montana and drove across the border to Canada. We stopped at an incredible restaurant near Fernie - where we asked Zach to officiate our wedding. The five of us had a celebratory drink and kicked off the trip on a really high note. We booked a front country campsite near the trailhead for the night before. It was a very, very cold morning packing up the tent and we started to wonder if we had timed this trip a little too late.
Our worries were quickly dismissed once we started moving and saw the beauty of the fall colors all around us. It was a long first day clocking about 10 miles with 4k vert - but the variety of terrain we traveled was maybe even more noteworthy. We started in the sub-alpine, made our way above tree line, and the views became more and more spectacular as we ascended higher.
When we decided to bring mega tent as our tent for the trip, we didn’t really factor into account what other people on the trail might think. The sheer height of mega tent was probably intimidating to other campers at this designated backcountry campsite. It stands 7 feet tall. People were looking at us crazy as though there’s no way that someone hiked that monstrous tent all the way in there. Oh, but we did. It was glorious. All of us could stand up in mega tent and it created ample room for card games at night - which was especially helpful as it got dark (and vert cold) before 6 pm so we had a lot of tent time together.
Zach, our fearless leader who planned this trip, was actually a bit fearful of the winds taking mega tent down in the night. She (somewhat shockingly) held up beautifully. The five of us had a great first night in Mega Tent other than Grady’s sleeping pad slowly deflating. We often each carry half of a closed foam cell pad as a backup that also doubles as a seat cushion - we were glad we did on this trip.
The fall colors on the second day were magical. The sunlight hitting the yellow leaves was just picture perfect all day long. The surreal views continued when we arrived to our campsite. The group had said this spot would be a highlight, but I hadn’t seen photos yet and it blew me away. Even though it was cold at the lake both in the evening and during sunrise the next morning - we truly had incredible conditions to experience this stunning place.
We were sad to leave the lake on the third day, but like many of our trips - our hike out was motivated by food. We drove back to Montana where we had home cooked Italian food and held our annual chip crunching competition. Adam was crowned the champion of this years competition and he surely wasn’t quiet about letting everyone know. We’re hopeful to bring the trophy back to Colorado next year!
We always have the best time with this group and are already excited for where the trip next year will take us.