Day 21
We woke up and got moving around 7:30 am. The Trail continued to be a mess with blowdowns and brush for a couple of miles, then it slowly started to clear a little. I took a wrong turn down the Mistaya River Alternate and was getting really annoyed with how poor that trail was until I realized my mistake, 0.7 miles in. So, I had to turn around and go back to the junction. That was super frustrating so close to town (well, kind of town….our resupply boxes, at the Crossing Resort Motel near Sasquatchewan Crossing). When I got to the highway we decided to hitchhike the three miles of highway walking. The highway had a narrow shoulder and wasn’t a very safe place to walk anyway. We got to the Crossing Resort at a little before 2 pm and picked up our boxes and I called my friend Martijn in The Netherlands before it was too late in Europe. There was no cell reception at the Crossing but you could pay 10.50 for Wifi, which I did (and promptly passed the password to Adi, who was grateful.). We got lunch at the restaurant, which wasn’t very good-but nice to have at least one “town” meal before we go back into the woods for a week. We walked out about 5 pm and walked a few miles down the trail and camped next to a creepy looking cabin. Adi was unruffled and set up her tent right next to the cabin. I set up mine on the opposite end of the site. We did some planning and calculating and figured we could actually spend 7 days in this section instead of 6 and still finish the Trail on August 25. So hopefully it will be more relaxed.
Day 22 Today was both the longest sustained climb of the entire GDT and the highest point on the Trail. We had 5400 feet of elevation gain today-the first climb up Owen Creek was 3500 feet. We hiked 13.3 miles and it took us 12 hours. Our backpacks are also really heavy with 7 days of food-not an ideal time to do so much climbing but it can’t be helped. The Trail was incredibly beautiful, alpine and passing above cerulean blue Michele Lakes. This is why we do this.
Day 23
We hiked 16.5 miles over Cataract Pass today and into Jasper National Park. We initially dropped down to Pinto Lake and it was a really beautiful, huge lake-Adi decided she wanted to take a swim, but it was only 9 am and I wasn’t in the mood to swim. Unfortunately for me I once again took a wrong turn onto a side trail and hiked about a kilometer up that before realizing my mistake and turning around. By that time Adi had gotten ahead of me and was confused about where I was. The Trail went through some boggy, marshy fields and continually disappeared and I made really slow progress. Eventually it started to gain elevation and was a little better-but there were many blowdowns. Most of the day was frustrating, hot, slow hiking. I just kept listening to podcasts to keep myself sane. The Trail slowly got above treeline and then entered a big creek full of waterfalls which I had to pretty much climb. Finally at the end of the day the Trail headed up to Cataract Pass, which was incredibly beautiful in the evening light. I finally found Adi camped a couple of miles down from the Pass, still in the alpine-she was happy to see me. We both cowboy camped (without tents) because it was windy. It was incredible place to camp, the sun setting over the smoky mountains.
Day 24
We hiked 17 miles from the Brazeau River to the Jonas Campground. It was hot all day and uneventful-very pretty in the alpine area around the headwaters of the Brazeau, and also with some fun rock scrambling. The trail followed a river for a long time and then went over Jonas Shoulder. At the Campground we chatted over dinner with some nice folks from Edmonton.
Day 25
We hiked another 17 miles today from Camp Jonas to Mary Vaux Campground. I was just kind of drowsy and not interested in hiking in the morning. I think I need to zero again–I’m just feeling really tired from how tough the Trail has been. It was downhill for 10 miles before heading up over Maligne Pass. It started to rain in the early afternoon which got really cold and turned into freezing rain at the Pass. Not nice. I moved pretty quickly over the Pass and got down to the Campground early, about 5:30, to find Adi shivering and cooking dinner. I set up my tent and made a little campfire-which tried valiantly to burn for awhile and then gave up to the continued rain. It was also really smoky today from the forest fires, and my lungs are getting wheezy from it-but I must have dropped my inhaler somewhere. Not dangerous, just uncomfortable.
Day 26
Another cold, wet day. The morning started with a thunderstorm and it rained on and off all day. The Trail notes (and two section hikers who were going southbound) had told us that there was about 10 miles of “unmaintained trail” to contend with in this section-very overgrown with willows and small trees, lots of blowdowns, difficult to follow. I was not excited about this after going through section D and had looked for an alternate route, but it was necessary to do this section to connect Maligne Pass to the world famous Skyline Trail in Jasper, none of which I wanted to skip. So we muscled through. The trail actually wasn’t nearly as bad as it had been described–there was a really clear track the whole time, sometimes it was just badly overgrown. The cold rain got us soaking wet in about 5 minutes from the “carwash effect ” of walking through all those overgrown plants, and we stayed cold and wet all day. We hiked 17 miles to Maligne Lake where there is a visitors center. Adi told me she was worried she wasn’t going to be able stay warm overnight because her sleeping bag had gotten wet, her tent kept breaking, and her sleeping pad had holes in it and kept deflating. It was cold enough that if you stopped hiking for five minutes you could feel your body temperature starting to drop. We decided we should hitchhike to the town of Jasper and dry out. We went into the visitors center to try and figure out what to do-the girl working in the gift shop was really nice and let us use the computer to look for lodging in Jasper. But, literally every motel and hostel was fully booked. I had resigned us to the fate of sleeping in the rain again and having a very uncomfortable and maybe unsafe night when the girl, Shannon, offered to let us stay at her apartment in Jasper. THANK YOU, SHANNON. Some people deserve a medal for stepping in at the perfect time and helping. A family from Northern Ireland in vacation had overheard us talking and offered to drive us the 45 minutes to Jasper-also really nice. We got some dinner in town and Adi found out that the third solo female hiker, Arisa, was actually in town, so we invited her to come have a beer. It was really fun to hear how the Trail had been for her so far. We then headed to Shannon’s apartment and passed out on the pullout couch. It was beyond heavenly to stay somewhere warm and dry.
Day 27
We got moving and hitchhiked about 9am, catching a ride with a girl who is an employee at the boat house at Maligne Lake. Lucky for us. We started to hike up the Skyline trail-it was a beautiful morning, sunny and cool. Adi was feeling pretty tired-the aggressive terrain and bad weather was really wearing on her and she decided that she wanted to take some extra time to get to Jasper and hike slowly. I, for some reason, felt great and hiked pretty quickly up and over 2 of the 3 passes for the day. I went more slowly on the 3rd one, which is called “The Notch”. The Skyline Trail is almost comically perfect-I think it’s the best trail on the GDT so far. It goes through some high alpine areas. The air was still pretty smoky and visibility wasn’t great, but better than yesterday. I hiked 18.6 miles to Tekarra Camp.
Day 28
I got up and started hiking about 7:45 am. The air was filled with smoke-and I have a headache that just won’t quit, maybe related to the smoke. I hiked down the ridge to “trail 7” which dumps into Jasper eventually-but when I got to the base of the hill there was a closure notice of this trail system because a grizzly bear had attacked two mountain bikers. No thanks. I walked the road into town, but for the final kilometer was picked up by Christie who owns the in-town hostel and a bed and breakfast. She let me know the hostel where I’m staying is outside town on a mountain. Great. I got an amazing $14 falafel sandwich which Adi loudly rebuked later (“you paid $14 for falafel??!? It’s supposed to be street food!!!”). Then did my laundry and called the Netherlands. Martijn asked how I’m doing and I kind of teared up–it’s actually been pretty tough the last couple weeks, and I feel kind of ill from the smoke and run ragged. It’s time to take a zero day. I hitchhiked up to the hostel with 2 very nice ladies in an RV and got checked in, felt better after I showered and relaxed for awhile. Only 10 more hiking days (not counting the road walk), then off to Utrecht for a week to rest.
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