Wed, Aug 11 2010, Thu, Aug 12 2010, Fri, Aug 13 2010, Sat, Aug 14 2010, Sun, Aug 15 2010, Mon, Aug 16 2010 - Great Divide Trail: Owen Creek to Nigel Pass (View Original Event Details)
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This trip should be changed to Owen Creek to Sunset Pass.
We left Edmonton on Wednesday after picking up the group and we arrived at the Nordegg Hostel at 9:30pm in time to check ourselves in and enjoy a decent sleep. In the morning, we left Nordegg and drove about an hour to the trailhead at Owen Creek. We parked our vehicle at the bear warning sign.
After getting our packs on, we were on the trail at 10:15am with overcast skies. The initial trail up Owen Creek to a large gorge / canyon was good however we soon encountered some heavy blowdown which required some interesting moves in the forest to get around the section. Having obtained some information about the Owen Creek trail conditions, we knew this blowdown was only one section and that it did not get worse later on. The gorge / canyon was very deep and was a nice distraction while hiking up the lower section of Owen Creek. At this time, we met Doug, a GDT thru hiker who remained with us for the rest of the day. The travel up Owen Creek offered a decent trail which at times was quite good, other times quite poor, where it required boulder hopping up the creek bed, or carefully moving across steep embankments along the creek. Other sections, it was clambering over logs, under logs but for the most part, it was just a matter of perseverance until we made it to tree line. The going was definitely slow as the trail never really made it possible to go quick. Plus after a couple hours, it began to rain which made the going up very wet, the rocks, logs, and roots somewhat slick. The rain did let up as we made our way past tree line and into the alpine area below an unnamed pass. The trail disappeared once in the alpine but the way was obvious as we just plodded away to reach the pass. This pass was a nice spot to regroup and most followed a high ridge / spine down which soon offered excellent views of Michele Lakes, (you cannot see Michele Lakes from the pass). We arrived at Upper Michele Lake at about 7:30 or 8pm. These two alpine lakes were gorgeous. We knew camping was suitable in a limited area so we found a nice spot between a flood plain and the upper Michele Lake. This had a nice waterfall which gave us a good water source. The rain had let up since nearing the pass so we set up camp and cooked our supper without the rain. This first day while only 13km, was still a difficult day and the rough trail certainly took its toll on some of our group. Some even had deep bruising on their legs.
It rained during the night and into the early morning. Motivation to leave our dry tents was low. We did manage to have a brief pause from the rain to eat breakfast and break camp, (with wet tents). The breakfast entertainment came when Holly lost her bowl which went over the waterfall, she eventually caught it on the downstream entering the lake. Our objective today was two high passes before descending into Pinto Lake. Our first pass (2590m), for the day happened to be the highest on the GDT but with a high starting point from Michele Lakes, it was a mere hour before cresting this high unnamed pass. The rain and drizzle continued but we did catch a glimpse of how high and impressive this pass was. From the pass, we could see our next pass across the valley, (Waterfalls Creek Valley). We spotted the faint markings of a trail on the opposite side of this valley so we simply descended the pass aiming to pick up the trail across Waterfalls Creek. Travel down from the pass was off-trail and easy going since we could stay in the sub-alpine. We had to hike downstream on Waterfalls Creek a few hundred metres but we did spot the trail which climbed steeply to the next pass. The trail petered out once it hit the alpine but the cross country travel was straight forward and we were soon on our second pass of the day, another unnamed pass. From here, we couldn’t see Pinto Lake nor an immediate trail but we knew it would become obvious further down so we descended down steep but soft scree and dirt from the pass into the headwaters of the unnamed creek which would flow down valley into Pinto Lake. Apparently if you remain high off the pass on a bench, there is the horse trail which starts high but we missed that. However, we picked up the excellent horse trail lower down the creek valley which we followed for what seemed like a while, to the first campground at Pinto Lake. This was primarily a horse camp but we found our friend Doug who had already started a fire so we opted to camp here and not hike the 1km further to the main Pinto Lake camp. By this time, the rough and difficult trail had taken a beating on some of our group. Hoping to regroup and reenergize here overnight for the next day which promised to be the longest of our trip, we cooked supper by the fire, some tried to dry out their boots & clothes, but we mostly just enjoyed the campfire telling stories and enjoying the end of the day and being in the backcountry. By 11pm, we retired for the night.
Our objective today was to reach the upper Cataract Creek Valley. With the physical condition of some members of our group at this point, it was apparent even the previous day that we were not going to have the extra time / day to day hike into the Valley of the Lakes, much to my disappointment as this was a key objective for this trip. We did awake to clear blue sky which I had hoped would lift some of our spirits and provide some motivation to reach our objectives. The sun did lift our spirits but for some however, the night’s rest did little to gain strength lost over the previous two days of strenuous and difficult hiking. We left camp and reached the outlet stream coming off Pinto Lake which required a ford but brought us to a trail on the opposite (north) bank. We followed this good trail and soon came upon the sign and register box for the White Goat Wilderness Area. It was already 12 noon and so this seemed like a good snack / rest stop. A group member was having some difficulty at this point and even though the distance already covered this morning was less than 4km at this point, the member was in bad shape. Our rest stop was a long 45 minutes but we decided to keep on hiking down the trail. In minutes we reached another creek crossing. This spot has the Cline River with another creek feeding it from another valley. Seeing that there was a trail in the forest heading downstream on the other side of the Cline (south bank), we forded the river and kept on hiking down this excellent trail on the south bank of the Cline. After 15 minutes this trail led us back to the Cline River bank and there was another creek intersecting with the Cline. Holly and I forded the Cline here to see if we could make out any sign of a trail on the other side but after 30 minutes of searching, nothing obvious could be found. I was also nervous since I saw no evidence of hikers but only horse prints on this south bank trail. After studying the guidebook map, I concluded that we were on a horse trail that was on the south bank and that we needed to backtrack to the previous area where we had crossed the Cline with the other creek intersecting the Cline which I determined to be Huntington Creek which through guidebook description was the creek we had to ford to eventually reach Cataract Creek. However, once across the Huntington Creek and on the north bank of the Cline, no evidence of a trail was seen, not even a faint trail. We did hike in the general direction of where the Cataract Creek and valley should be and where the route should go more or less but the travel was not easy despite being close to open terrain near the Cline River. After 4 hours, we eventually found Cataract Creek and what appeared to be the correct spot to ford the Cataract Creek to the east bank which would then go north on the GDT route to the Cataract Valley and pass. It was 5pm now and given the condition of some members of our group, I made the decision with the group to turn back and make camp at the Cline River and its confluence with Huntington Creek. We would then opt to return the next morning back to Pinto Lake and hike out to the hwy via Sunset Pass in the next couple of days. This was a frustrating after-noon for me. The route description for this section was vague and difficult and having to turn back was disheartening for me. In retrospect, we should have just kept going on the horse trail on the south bank of the Cline to intersect the trail going up to the Cataract Creek Valley lower down, while not as direct a route as what the guidebook offered, it would have perhaps saved time in the end by having good trail to follow. It is hard to say but the extra 3-4kms for this variant may have been worth it. We made our camp for the night and retired quite early.
We got going today knowing that we had 2 more days left so it seemed like we could take 2 easy days to hike back to Pinto Lake and over Sunset Pass to the hwy. We easily retraced our trail to Pinto Lake and from the map, we decided to try a more direct route over Sunset Pass, (not the winding horse trail). This involved a rough trail around Pinto Lake to another campsite which had a trail heading steeply to a large gulley. This gulley was steep and the rocks loose. To my surprise, our entire group made it up this section and we then breached the upper headwall and topped out onto Sunset Pass. Since the group seemed okay to push on to the hwy, we opted not to make a camp but continued hiking through Sunset Pass, stopping at a creek for a nice 45 minute break, before passing Norman Lake CG and the eventual highway. Sunset Pass was very nice. The meadows were expansive and the mountains were beautiful here. Holly and I hiked ahead to try and reach the trailhead so we could get a jump on the hitchhike back to Owen Creek where we left our vehicle. As I was nearing the parking lot, I saw two hikers ahead and quickly met up with them at their car asking if they could drive us back to our vehicle. They were going back to Calgary and did not mind giving us a lift. This was so nice! We avoided the whole thumb thing from the road. We got our vehicle and drove back to the trailhead and soon the rest had reached the parking lot trailhead at 7:30pm. We stopped at the Crossing for snacks then eventually Rocky for a nice (late) dinner at Boston Pizza. We arrived back in Edmonton at close to 2am. For myself, I was back home in Vegreville by 3am! Yikes.
In conclusion. It was a good trip and I enjoyed the group. While we did not reach all my intended objectives (namely Cataract Valley / Pass / Lake, Valley of the Lakes, Nigel Pass), the things we did see were enjoyable and beautiful. I was happy that we could finish the trip by taking just the one day over Sunset Pass, making for a pleasant 4-day trip. The weather was 50/50. First two days of mostly rain and clouds but the final two days of pure blue sky and sunshine! We did manage through the rain for those first two days and the rain did let up every so often to allow some time to cook and make / break camp. For me the two highlights were as expected, Michele Lakes with its rare rock glacier and the high pass of the GDT. Certainly the high alpine travel from Owen Creek to Pinto Lake was outstanding! It would have been nice to further explore Michele Lakes but certainly is an excuse to come back. Also, in a future trip, it may be wise to avoid the route finding between Huntington and Cataract Creek and just use the Cline River south bank horse trail, the added 3-4kms may well save 3-4 hours of frustrating route finding. Also, in the future, I will most likely attempt these rough, strenuous, difficult, off-trail, and wilderness routes with people I know and trust as this may save some frustration. All in all, I thank those who ventured out into this remote section of the Rockies.
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