Grandmothers are very handy for enabling quality adventuring time with Alex. So handy, that we took advantage of one more opportunity, and had a go at running Northover Ridge with Al and Lincoln.
This year the southern side of the lake trail had re-opened, with the flood damage largely repaired.
We did a slightly better job of picking a route around Hidden Lake this time (compared to last year), and flew up the trail above it to the scree beneath Mount Sarrail.
Sadly wildflower season was basically over by this time though, so we missed out on the gorgeous splashes of colour. There are some advantages to going slightly later in the season though – especially with the amount of snow that still remained on the ridge!
We ran around Aster Lake to the south – which was much drier than the northern shores, hurrah.
As we hiked up towards Warrior Mountain, I tried to take a photo of Aster Lake. Somehow I managed to turn on this weird postcard mode – I have no idea how it happened, or where the setting for it is, or even how I managed to turn it back to normal photo mode really.
But from there on, it was just scree, scree, scree, scree…
Scree, scree, tarns and scree.
Scree, scree, scree, people, tarns and scree.
Until finally we hit the ridge. Where it was quite cold and windy! Actually, mostly windy.
But still breathtakingly beautiful of course.
We trotted along, stopping for photo breaks, and to throw snowballs.
It was around this point where we had an epic battle with a wizard. We distracted his dragon while Al and Lincoln ran off to the end of the ridge. But Alex and I were unable to defeat him, and thus made a strategic retreat, luring his attentions away so that the others could successfully make it down via Three Isle Lake.
We turned back the way we had come, which had the advantage for Al and Lincoln of a car coming around to pick them up at the end, and for us of seeing what it’s like to descend on the anti-clockwise loop. A completely different trail! Well, obviously not literally a completely different trail, but a very different feel.
Back to the car, another awesome day in the mountains where we weren’t defeated by any wizards. Legs are a bit sore though, and feeling quite hungry.
Distance: 35km (For going clockwise around the loop, getting nearly all the way to the end of the ridge before turning back)
Elevation gain: 1850m