Adventureman Mountaineering - Climb Higher: November 2011

Paget Peak
Field, British Columbia
November 21, 2010

Paget Peak is located a few kilometres east of Field BC (about 200km north west of Calgary) and just south of the Continental Divide. It occupies the position at the southern end of the Mount Daly Range and is located directly west of Mt. Bosworth. Paget Peak also houses one of the first fire lookouts in Canada's national parks system, and that lookout is still there, and it is the trail to this lookout that takes you 3/5 of the way to the summit.

Looking for an easy scramble, a group of 10 of us decided to head out to Paget Peak knowing it was an easy scramble. The drive to West Louise Lodge took just under 2 hours and we arrived at the trailhead just before 8AM. The sky was clear and the wind minimal but the thermometer in the car was already reading -27C. Several people decided to gear up outside the cars and quickly found the drinking tubes do not stand a chance in such cold temperatures as within a few minutes their drinking tubes were frozen solid. This brought them back in the cars briefly to thaw out their tubes.

Paget Lookout

The trip begins along the trail to Sherbrooke Lake however, after about 1.5km the trail turns right and heads towards Paget Lookout. With the deep snow, it took us about 25 to 30 minutes to come to the trail junction. Snowshoes really made this quicker and the wide trail was visible even under the deep snow. The trail after the junction gently switchbacked up the side of the mountain, however, the trees almost never provided a break and views were extremely limited. We were hoping that as the day went on, the temperature would increase, but in fact the temperature continued to drop as a northern front moved in, add to that the gain of elevation and the chill was really starting to set in. After about an hour-twenty, with cold extremities, we reached Paget Lookout.

Paget Lookout is about 3/5 of the way up Paget Peak and located by a cliff which provides awesome views to the south towards Wapta Lake, Mt. Stephen, Mt. Victoria, Lake. O'Hara and the Kicking Horse Valley. This unfortunately was the end of the trail for two of our members. With our portable thermometer reading -37C, they decided their gear was unfit for this temperature and together descended with radio in hand to the West Louise Lodge for warm drink, food and rest. The rest of the group took inventory of gear and attitudes and decided to continue to the summit (some likely should have tuned back, but summit fever is a wonderful thing).

Scrambling the rocks

Beyond the Lookout the trail ends and a rocky scree/talus slope with some rock bands lies between you and the summit. This slope is quite deceiving as the summit is foreshortened, what looks like 100m vertical is in fact about 350m more as you are looking at the false summit. In the deep snow, the trip up was slow. Snowshoes were no longer much help (so they were stashed at the Lookout) and with the trail invisible under the snow (if there is one), the group broke into two teams and started switchbacking up the slope. One team headed directly to the small rock bands, the other team decided to head left and skirted around them. The climb up the slope was uneventful except for a few places where steps ended up with legs stuck between boulders and large rocks as snow was about mid-thigh depth.As we finally crested the ridge after the trudge up the steep slope and a short unnecessary scramble over the rocks, the snow depth decreased to about ankle depth, a telling tail of the high winds that scour the ridge.

Makeshift Summit Shot

Our summit visit as extremely short as our thermometer read -47C!!. The view from the summit was however amazing. In this frozen state and I don't think that I have been outside and had it so quiet before. To me, this was the most calm I have had on a mountain. However, due to the cold, no one was interested in digging for the summit register, so we had a quick makeshift summit shot and then before we knew it, over half the group was already descending. The views of Mt. Bosworth, Mt. Victoria, Mt. Stpehen, Mt. Niles, Mt. Ogden and Cathedral Mountain with the white veil of snow was well worth the climb, unfortunately the temperatures had virtually sucked the batteries in our camera empty, so no panorama was taken. In better weather, a hike along the ridge to a few higher easily accessible points would likely be a nice extension.

Descending

We followed our trail through the snow to descend back to the lookout. It took about 35 minutes to descend to the Lookout working through the mine field of rocks. We stopped in the lookout to refuel and have some drinks, unfortunately most drinks were frozen (except the warm hot chocolates). The two thermos' of hot chocolate made their rounds as even the large mouth Nalgene bottles inside backpacks and wrapped in insulation were slushy. After about 10 minutes in the Lookout (which is essentially a 4 walled structure with windows on three sides and benches) didn't provide much refuge from the base cold weather, as such it was still uncomfortable to sit in. We descended the trail back to the West Louise Lodge . On the way down the sun started to set behind Mt. Stephen , offering a nice soft glow. At the trailhead we met up with the other two members who were comfy inside the West Louise Lodge. We all ordered warm food and warm drinks before heading back to Calgary.

Passing out Hot Chocolate in the lookout

This trip proved to have some lasting effects on the team. Of the eight members that summited this day, six ended up getting between first and second degree frostbite, mainly on the nose, ears and toes thanks to the extreme temperatures encountered. Thankfully no permanent damage was done and the group eventually healed, however, such are the risks of winter mountain adventures.

Some other pictures of the trip.