Apparently I'm not intermediate
0 Comments Published by Ster on Thursday, April 24, 2008 at 11:30 AM.
Apparently when you do outdoor activities in BC you need to know your skill level. In Toronto, there are no activities that require a skill level. If I want to go to the ROM, all I need is basic geographic knowledge of the city’s layout and $20. With the same level of skill I can visit Kensington market, cruise Queen St on a busy Sunday afternoon and then go the gym. Apparently in BC there are further separations in the “skill level” of the citizens.
So when we first saw the sign that said
“Only experienced hikers with advanced skills should attempt this climb”
We didn’t think much of it. We made our way to the trailhead with our awesome Toronto “we can do anything” and “of course we’re experienced and advanced” attitudes.
When we reached the trailhead our attitudes quickly changed. The very first 10 steps on the trail involved scaling a large wall. It was meant as a message to say “if you can’t even get on the trail, you shouldn't attempt the accent”. We looked around for the “real route” and I’ll admit I was looking furiously for the short cut. None existed. Laughing and a bit shaken, we started our way up the mountain.
For the first 10 minutes Sam made me aware in intervals of 30 seconds that maybe this is dangerous and we’re not good enough to do it. Was she right? Were the signs below reading “intermediate climbers only” accurate? They couldn’t be…. So we kept climbing, having no clue what we were getting into.
About half way I started to worry, that I was putting us in danger. I figured it will probably get more steep as we keep going and if it starts raining we’re really going to be in a bad position. The rocks would be far too slippery to climb down on with no equipment and old runners. Sure enough, it did start to rain a bit. We were hot and panting because of the climb so we stripped down to our t-shirts, but the air and rain was chilling in a refreshing sort of way.
About half way up we found a large cliff overlooking how far we’ve come so far. At this point we ran into the fist signs of humans since we set out up the mountain. There was a group of indigenous tourism students that were trying to accomplish the same feat today. They started singing and their voices helped give us the drive to continue to the top.
Sure enough the second part of the climb was much more advanced. We used the roots of trees to pull us up to the next levels. In areas that were particularly steep we had to use chains and ladders to get up cliffs. Leg’s shaking, hands cold due to gripping on to cold rock and crawling to try to stay low to the ground we made our way up past the trees so we could really see how far we’ve come. What a visual present to reward us for all of our hard work and risks. No one else around. Just Sam and I. The sun peeked its head out from behind a cloud momentarily and shone on the lake and mountains below. We looked to our right and we were in the clouds. They were hovering right beside us.
We clung to trees for dear life and lectured each other on how important it is that we don’t look down, fall, or not test out every footing or hand hold as we keep making our way up. It’s all rock at this point. There are no more trees. Another 10 minutes up the mountain and I see the peak. But the wind picks up and because there are no trees I can see exactly how high and vulnerable we are. I get scared and push my body to the rock. I call for Sam to come and join me and I say “I think this is good enough”. She’s fully excited and says “we’ve come this far, it’s just 20 more yards up to the peak… get up, let’s go”. Knees rattling, hands shaking…. I crawl slowly up the peak and lay on my back. What a rush! Definitely the biggest nature accomplishment I’ve even had. No one else was on the peak of this mountain. Just Sam and I.
We enjoyed the peak for 15 minutes but as we looked around the clouds were moving in around us. I was petrified that it would rain and we would get stranded up in the mountain. There is no way we could make it down the last 10 minutes of cliff if it started raining.
I thought rain was inevitable. I was tying to think about the smartest safety thing to do in this situation. If we stayed at the top and got stranded at least a helicopter could hover over us and get us off the mountain. However, if we got stuck further down then we’d be in the forest and it would be hard to find us. Plus I kind of thought that ending our trip on an emergency helicopter ride would be a really cool story….. Then I realized I don’t even have a cell phone to call 911 if I needed to, plus it seemed like a thing that a 16 year old girl would do that didn’t get enough attention from her dad. So we started our desent.
The decent involved lots of nice “what if” games. Like “what would we do if a bear came at us right now”. For those of you who know me well, you know that I’m pretty sure I could beat the following animals in a fight…
1. A bear
2. A shark
3. An ostrich
Animals I don’t think I could beat in a fight
1. A school of piranhas
2. A horse
3. A tiger
Most people don’t think I would win against a bear. So I’m forced to explain how I would win. It’s dirty and unconventional but I think I could pull it off. Then they usually respond “but Ster you’ve never even been in 1 fight in your whole life”. And I’m like “phhh so… fighting a human and fighting a bear are two totally different skills”.
To sum up my story, we make our way back all the way down. We have huge smiles on our faces knowing that if we knew it was going to be that hard we probably wouldn’t have done it. But we were glad we did. Here are some pictures of the top!
