Bald Hills

Even though the air was thick with smoke today, Bald Hills is still one of our favorite hikes in Jasper. It begins at Maligne Lake and most of the elevation is gained via a steep fire road. We like it because the road doesn't have roots and, even though it has some loose stones in various sections, there are no big rocks of boulders! We climbed the first 1,575 feet, to the site of the Bald Hills Lookout, in slightly over one hour - 3.2 miles. We blasted our way to this first waypoint!

After the Lookout, the trail continues for another couple of miles and another 500 feet to a viewpoint among the alpine meadows. Unfortunately, today the wind was blowing the smoke from the BC wildfires right into Jasper. What is usually a breathtaking sight was mostly hidden from view. That's Maligne Lake.

Samson Peak, with the white stripe, rise on the opposite side of the valley. Maybe you can just make out the northern tip of Maligne Lake.

We went over the viewpoint ridge to a sheltered spot for lunch.

Valley view from our lunch spot.

After lunch we returned to the viewpoint ridge before hiking down the same way we came up.

The sweeping panoramic views might not be the best, but the wildflowers are always a treat. Here are some salmon-colored paintbrush and notice the fuchsia-colored one at the middle top of the picture. 

We also observed this mama quail, actually heard her first as she was making soft noises to her chicks that were...

well camouflaged by the side of the trail.

Today's hike:

Length - 9.4 miles (15 km)

Duration - 4 hours, 35 minutes

Elevation gain - 2,047 feet (620 meters)

Geraldine Lakes

Today's hike is described as "not for casual walkers."

The first part of the hike follows a typical root-laced trail up and over a ridge to Lower Geraldine Lake, the first of four Geraldine Lakes. Here we are, in the picture above, arriving at Lower Geraldine Lake. The trail got rougher as it follows the lake's west shore, very rocky and rooty as it climbs beside a waterfall cascading over rocks at the end of the Lake. 

At the top of the falls we entered this valley which was basically  a large boulderfield with a couple of tarns in the middle. At the end of this rock-chocked valley there was yet another waterfall which you can see in the distance.

Scrambling over rocks (not our favorite kind of hiking!), we arrived at the base of this impressive waterfall and it was time for lunch.

Lunch view.

Mountain peaks to the right of the fall, another lunch view.

We think this is Mount Fryatt above Lower Geraldine Lake.

A look back just before we entered to forest for the one-mile hike back to the trailhead and the car.

Today's hike:

Length - 5.37 rocky miles, (8.79 km)

Duration - 5 hours, 11 minutes

Elevation gain - 1,167 feet (328 meters)

Finally!

Success!! We were able to drive back to Hinton this afternoon and now we have two new tires.

Waiting just for us.

We had them rotate the back tires to the front and mount the two new tires on the back. The back tires receive the most wear when towing.

It was very warm today - high around 90 degrees. We were happy to drive in an air-conditioned car.

Almost

We drove to Hinton, very slowly on our "donut" spare, only to discover that the two tires that we ordered were delivered to the wrong location. The tire shop put a temporary tire on, in place of the spare, and we were able to drive back to Whistlers Campground at normal speed. We will return tomorrow.

Before we drove back from Hinton we stopped at the local Safeway and did a big grocery shop so that when we got back to the Airstream we were able to make two batches of soup. Not a completely wasted day!

Even though I took the camera on the drive to Hinton, it was very hazy from wildfire smoke so there were no good Panoramic picture worth taking. We scrounged around on our photos and came up with this Happy Birthday plate that Frederick received when we went out to dinner on Saturday, at the Moose's Nook in Fairmont Jasper Lodge, to celebrate his birthday. I enjoyed the little pink confection in the center - light as a cloud and tasting of raspberry!

Making Good Use

We don't feel that the tire that had the blowout yesterday is repairable so we have found the nearest OK Tire location, in Hinton, about 50 mile east of Jasper, on the highway to Edmonton. Ryan is ordering two new tires that will be shipped from Calgary and arrive tomorrow. Since we don't want to do a lot of driving on the spare, we decided to just go into town and do laundry - it's about time.

The only thing mildly interesting and picture-worthy is this license plate we saw in the parking lot. Pretty neat!

Cavell Meadows & Saving Our Day

This trail is definitely one of the top 10 best day hikes in the Canadian Rockies and probably one of the most popular trails in Jasper National Park. This summer there is lots of construction at the trailhead (new parking lot, etc.), which is 14 km, almost straight up, from the main road. In order to limit congestion, to start up the Cavell (rhymes with travel) Road you have to have permit. These are distributed from the main Visitor Center in Jasper from 7 am to 10 am daily.  On Monday we went into Jasper early and picked up a permit for today (you can get one for up to three days in advance) since the weather forecast for Wednesday had been for clear weather and highs in the upper 80's in Jasper. It would be cooler at Cavell Meadows which is at a much higher elevation. 

Everything was going according to plan, and we had just passed the parking lot for another trailhead 2 km from the trailhead for Cavell Meadows, when a major red warning flashed that a tire, the right front, was loosing air. Frederick immediately pulled off the road into a small pull-out and by the time we got out of the car and around to the tire, it was completely flat. Our first thought was to call for CAA roadside assistance, but our cell phones showed that there was "no service". Frederick began to get out the tools for changing the flat and I was waiting to flag down a returning car to take us down to the main road where we could make a phone call. No cars were going by (some going up, but none coming down) when Jeremy and Kristen came hiking down the road. They had been up at the Cavell Glacier skiing and were returning to their car which was parked in the trailhead parking lot below us. 

In the winter they both work at Marmot Ski Area and in the summer Jeremy is a server at a Jasper steak house and Kristen is a life-guard at Miette Hot Springs. They were our saviors!

Jeremy placed the jack under the car frame and raised the car. (Frederick had already loosened the lug nuts.)

Kristen use her slender fingers to remove the lug nuts.

Blown tire!!!

Working together, they soon had the blown tire off, the spare tire on, and Jeremy hefted the blown tire into the back of the Benz.

What a team, and we can't thank Jeremy and Kristen enough for so cheerfully lending a helping hand. Their assistance allowed us to get the car back in working order and we were able to drive up the 2 km to the Cavell Meadow Trailhead parking lot and enjoy our hike. If we had had to get CAA roadside assistance it would have consumed our whole day. Thank you, Jeremy and Kristen, for your wonderful gift!

Lots of icebergs in Cavell Pond at the base of Angel Glacier. You can just see the toe of the Angel Glacier in the upper center of the picture.

A charming pica, "nature's farmer."

Such a cutie - a ping-pong ball with ears!

Lunch spot above the southern junction of the Cavell Meadows loop - a great viewpoint.

Lunch spot from the left. There was a fair amount of smoke in the air today. It made us appreciate, even more, the beautiful, clear, day we had yesterday.

Lunch view. Cavell mountain to the left (sorry I cut it out of the picture) and Angel Glacier with Cavell Pond at the base.

The many hues of the wildflower Paintbrush. Here're three grouping in one patch along the side of the trail.

Red...

pink and...

peach colored flowers.

About three feet away, another shade of pink.

At the base of the trail - Cavell Pond.

Today's hike:

Length 4.23 miles (7.01 km)

Duration - 3 hours (including lunch)

Elevation gain - 1,476 feet (413 meters)

Opal Hills

There are two outstanding hike that begin at the northwest tip of Malinge Lake and we enjoy them both - Opal Hills and across a valley, Bald Hills. For great views of the lake, go to Bald hills, and for the best wildflowers, the alpine meadows of Opal Hills, the shorter but steeper trail. As one trail guide states - from the trailhead, "the trail dips briefly and then heads grimly upward through dense lodgepole pine forest with nary a switchback, gaining elevation at a heart-pounding rate."

The trail is a lollypop, splitting at the 1.6 km point. When we got to the split, the left hand trail had a closed for bear sign. We knew that the meadow at the top of the lollypop attracted grizzlies so we weren't too surprised. We had intended to take the right hand trail to the top so we went on, wondering how far we would get before this branch closed. We met some people coming down and they told us the trail into the meadow was closed but that we could continue on a trail that climbed the side of the Opal Hills. On we went!

We usually don't stop for pictures on the way up the trail, except for animals. Usually we see marmots among the rocks in meadows, but this big fellow was hiding out in the woods. We speculated that maybe it was trying to avoid the bear up in the meadow, bears love marmots. 

Sure enough, when the trail emerged from the woods, the junction into the meadow was closed so we took a trail to the right and continued to climb.

What we got for our efforts were incredible views of Maligne Lake and the twin peaks of Mounts Unwin and Charlton.

Down below we could see the meadow and the trail running through it at the base of the two small hills on the left. The Opal Hills are to the right.

Opal Peak 

This is as far as we went, to the ridge that we guessed would take us to the top of the peak. Maybe another day.

It was very windy on the high ridge so we came down a bit a found a lunch spot in a meadow on the side of the trail.

Lunch view, the meadow that is hosting a bear this summer. We never saw the bear.

Some of the high altitude view we enjoyed while we ate our lunch.

Maligne Lake with a tour boat heading for Spirit Island. Those are the twin peaks on the left.

The northern end of Maligne Lake with the docks on the right.

Heading back down the ridge to take the same trail back down through the woods. The valley meadow is in the center at the base of the Opal Hills.

On the drive back to Jasper we passed these two mountain range ramparts. They are know as the Queen Elizabeth Range and...

the Colin Range.

Today's hike:

Length - 4.88 miles (7.86 km)

Duration - 3 hours, 24 minutes (including lunch)

Elevation gain - 2,070 feet (625 meters)