33. Sherbrooke Lake/Niles Meadow

Distance: 19.6 km
Elevation gain: 717 m

It's Larch season but I didn't want to repeat a hike so we found a new one and hoped for colour. To avoid crowds and have great weather, we went on Friday. Tena and Harry joined us for this premier hike in Yoho National Park. Harry left his bearbell in the car and tapped his poles like a grasshopper instead. We saw no bears or wildlife other than a few birds and butterflies but the trail and views were stupendous
To start off, the walk through the woods was bordered by the biggest, juiciest bunchberries we had ever seen or tasted.

After a few kilometres, we reached Sherbrooke Lake, a pretty, blue, mountain lake. All of a sudden, we noticed  the amazingly clear, large reflection of the surrounding mountains. The image seemed to go as deep as the mountains were tall. This particular picture has Mount Niles in the background. Many snapshots later we continued the hike along the lake.

The trail led along Sherbrooke Creek and featured several cascades which easily drowned out our grasshopper and even Herm's whistling.

Then we arrived at the book's "spacious meadow" but thought it was the amphitheatre and that it was recommended to eat our lunch. So we found a big rock and ate since we were hungry.

After some more hiking and creek crossing we entered the real amphitheatre. Beautiful! And looking up, we saw the meadow we had to reach yet to get the full marvel of this trail.

We continued slowly up the trail and sat thankfully in the meadow to finish our lunch, pose for a picture and admire the valley stretching out in front of us.

From Nile Meadow, we saw Mt. Temple from another direction, still recognizable by its size and snow cover.

We walked to the shoulder of the meadow and looked down on the amphitheatre.

As expected there were more mushrooms than flowers at this time of year. It was joyful to see the variety of shapes, colours and arrangements.

Another fall treat on this trail were the bountiful,(in one spot) ripe, unwormy gooseberries. They were delicious but we left some for the bears.

On the way back, the sun had mostly gone behind the mountains so we were surprised but very pleased to see the lake still mirrored beautiful reflections.

32. Fairview Mountain, (b)

Distance: 10.6 km
Elevation Gain: 1014 m

September 9th, a bright Monday ( better than the rainy Saturday before) we climbed Fairview Mountain for the first time, with assurances from others that it was quite easy. It was a glorious hike, one of our better ones.
 We drove to Lake Louise and started hiking through beautiful, mossy green forest on a trail wide enough for us to walk side by side

Herm found some delicious blueberries but alas there were not very many.

 

 The trail soon opened up on one side and we could see across the valley, ski slope, village and the Bow River.

Soon we got up to the Saddleback and enjoyed the larches which were just starting to turn yellow as well as the surrounding mountains and glaciers.  Mount Temple, with its snow cover, stood taller than the others.

To the north was Fairview, a steep climb but clear trail.

The steep climb forced Herm to sit periodically to give his heart a chance to return to normal. It also prompted both of us to take more time to look around.

We made it to the top and posed at the cairn. We chatted with Germans, Japanese and Canadians over lunch. It was not a place for solitude.

We looked over the side to see iconically green Lake Louise far below.

It was interesting to see the Plain of Six Glaciers from a totally new perspective.

Looking south, we considered going back to the Saddleback and running up Saddle Mountain.

But when we got down and looked at the mountain close up, our knees clearly said,"not today".

We continued on down the comfortably wide trail and took a last look at Fairview Mountain from the trailhead at the Lake Louise canoe rental shop.

Mount Fairview B
August 24, 2016 my sisters and I climbed Mt. Fairview. Doreen had been training in Ottawa and we all made it up without difficulty. This was still August and I found many, many blueberries but they were not ripe yet. The plant attraction was a large variety of mushrooms all through the woods.