Nuff Ting Gwon: Photography, Film & Adventure

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!

We shout “cuidado” (“careful” in Spanish) to each other as we descend into the valley hugging the river below. We need to make our way down about 200 feet to get to the crystal clear river below, but there is no path and the decline is steep… Impossible in many areas. We carefully dig our fingers into the roots of the trees above and carefully make our decent, double checking each branch, rock and root we grab onto in order to test its trustworthiness. We slowly get closer to something we haven’t seen, only heard, but we just “have a good feeling about it”.

Closer to the bottom it becomes slightly more dangerous but we see the river up close at last. About 8 feet deep in the deepest part and crystal clear green water at the foot of a waterfall. The sounds, the sights the smells are spectacular. All senses are stimulated. We get ninety percent of the way there, but we are now faced with one last obstacle. We need to trek across a fallen tree that’s covered in slippery moss. I start to make my way across to test it out but turn back because it simple wasn’t safe or intelligent. Thankfully, Sam finds a small cliff with a hollowed out tree trunk that we can hold onto while we descend the last 10 feet.

We made it all the way down, and it’s more breathtaking than we anticipated. We jumped rock to rock, trying not to get our feet wet as we make our last few steps towards a big rock in the middle of the river. We find comfort on the rock awarded to us by mother nature herself for making our journey off the beaten path 200 feet above. I looked at Sam, who was perched on the same rock as me, and said “this place is totally symbolic to all of the benefits that carving out your own route in this world has. It’s kinda like with all things… ya know? If you take the time, risk a little, and work a little harder than you would if you took the carved out path above, you will be seriously rewarded at the end. Ya heard?” ** (Footnote - 1) . I loved the symbolism and meaning in what we just did.

We waited until it started to get dark then we made our way back to the town as to not get lost in the woods at night. Getting lost at night in the woods is something I really want to do, but have yet to convince Sam that it would be fun and safe. Using the same approach as our “carve your own path” strategy earlier, we make our way back to a local general store using a new route. Unfortunately, this time we went a little too far in the wrong direction and found ourselves in the most uninspiring, run of the mill residential suburb we’ve ever been through.

Today really boils down to two lessons.

1. Beauty, meaning, love, inner peace and deep, rich experiences are found on the road less traveled

2. Apparently so are the suburbs.

Labels: Vancouver