Thursday, February 4, 2010

Day 7-8, Brohm Peak and Brohm Ridge



In a attempt to climb Mt Garibaldi last week-end, we headed towards Brohm ridge with the goal to reach the glacier before dark. I guess things did really not turn out the way we thought it would.

First mistake: We did not pack light:


We headed with the 4x4 jeep on the Cheeky FSR, and we took the left road as we were told by the president of the VOC.
We were hoping to reach an altitude of 1000m, but we had to stop at about 850 m, not bad for this time of the year.

We put on our rented touring skis and started heading towards the logging road, with for first goal the snowmobile hut.

Now, I would have though that a snowmobile hut at this location would have been a small hut, same kind that there is in the brandywine valley, mais au contraire!! It is actually 2 huge 3 story chalets managed by the blacktusk snowmobile club. I m not a big fan of snomobiling but the location is really amazing and there is many rooms, a great place to party. But they do have a bit too much comfort for my taste (flat screen tv, pool table, etc)

We took a huge amount of time to do the 5 km between the car and the hut located at 1400 m. The problem was that my feet were blistering on all sides from the skiboots that were too small for me.

We stayed a while at the hut in order to rest and heal our feet. My freind had the brilliant idea to tell me to take off the linings. This actually helped a lot, I added 3 pairs of socks. It was not the best but it allowed to bear the pain.

After a long 30 min break, we headed back out in the fog and went on some snowmobile road, in the middle of the snowmobiles....
Besides the very annoying noise, I have to admit that these snowmobilers were respectful and careful about our presence.

It was actually so foggy that we could barely see them.



This part of the trip was much more pleasant. We made it to the ridge and because we knew that Garibaldi was hopeless, we aimed for the much more modest Brohm peak. With the help of my mighty GPS, we found the route as things were clearing up a bit.

Victory of the day we made to the easy summit of Brohm peak, and as a reward we got to get a glimpse of Garibaldi Mountain and Mt Atwell.




We went further up the ridge for another 30 min and found a good camping spot.
We set up tent and got ready for a night that was not so cold.
The night was clear, nothing like the next morning
.


We woke up in the complete fog which only motivated us to go back down, we were cold and blisterd, but the fun with the pals made it all well worth it.
We headed back town in a complete whiteout.


Once we got low enough on the logging road , we started to get views on the Tantalus range which saved the day.


Without a lie, we were very happy to make it back to the car and admire our many blisters, som e big as my thumbs.


No comments:

Post a Comment