Yoho Pass Trail

In an earlier blog we mentioned being in a place where there is "dark sky", it's also a wild place to be in a thunder & lightning storm. Yesterday was on-and-off-again rain, overnight it rained fairly heavily and this morning at 6:15 am there was lightning and thunder along with buckets of rain. The  people next to us are in a tent and at 6:15 am, their car lights went on and they left the campground - their tent is still here but they are probably still trying to dry out because it has continued to rain most of today. I read somewhere that these valleys trap precipitation and that some of the vegetation is similar to the rain forests of coastal British Columbia.

Today was a good day to put our rain-gear to the test, so we returned to Emerald Lake and hiked the western side of the lake trail through western hemlock, western yew and the most extensive western red cedar forest in Yoho. The western red cedar if British Columiba's provincial tree.

At the trailhead of the Yoho Pass Trail spur off the Lake circuit trail there were two benches, one facing the Lake and the other facing the mountain. Here's the view towards the Lake and...

looking toward the mountain . You can see one of the larger alluvial fans in Rockies. Most alluvial fans were established between 6000 and 7000 years ago by meltwater surges as the Earth's climate warmed rapidly after the Late Wisconsin Glaciation. The Emerald Fan is slowly filling Emerald Lake. Aerial views indicate that 50 % of the lake's former area is now  glacial rubble. 

The trail continued across the alluvial fan where, because of poor soil, glacial winds, and a fluctuating water table, the Emerald Fan is a harsh home for vegetation. A few lodgepole pines, gnarled white spruce, and white birch comprise the sparse tree cover. 

Various generations of bridges cross the Emerald Fan because glacial melt streams fluctuate daily and seasonally, and are prone to flash-floods. The I-beam bridges were installed at great expense over streams that promptly changed their courses, leaving the structures high and dry. 

The "boardwalk bridges" were designed to be portable, allowing trail crews to reposition the bridges as required. In practice, these heavy bridges are not portable. They frequently become buried in the debris of flash-floods. There were many times when we got our boots wet.

The falls at the point where we turned around.

We completed the Lake circuit during a pause in the rain. We did not see one bride on the water.

This being our last night at the Kicking Horse Campground in Yoho National Park, we did walk across the street for dinner at the Cathedral Mountain Lodge. You never know about the dining rooms at such places, but the meal was excellent.

Fortunately they did have a fire going because it is raining and the temperature is in the 40's.