82. South Baldy

Distance: 11km return
Elevation gain: around 800m

Wednesday, September 4, a beautiful sunny day for a hike. South Baldy is close so we decided to go for it. Trail guides have various opinions about the difficulty but we could always turn back.
We started the hike around 10:00 on a beautiful trail.
Except for asters, the fall flowers were finished, so we enjoyed the various mushrooms.

We got to Baldy Pass, snacked and determined to try climbing the ridge in front of us.

It was a steep, rocky trail. After a few extra steep sections, we came to a crux, with no trail but lots of handholds. (not really scary)

The rocky steep humps continued.

From the top of this one we looked south to Midnight Peak which we had climbed some years before. It looked much higher but not as rocky.

To the west we saw Nakiska ski slope.

To the east, clear cuts in the foothills.

We got to the final hump before the final peak and decided we had gone far enough on this kind of trail. We admired the view for a while and went back down to the pass.
Behind us, are the south peak, the north peak sticking out to the right and the west peak to the left.

Coming up, I thought the return would be treacherous, but we chose our steps carefully without mishap.
 Red patches of Alpine Bearberry welcomed us back to the pass.

81. Volcano Ridge

Distance: 10??km
Elevation gain: 320 m?

August 19, Monday we were camping at Blue Rock campground with Shixin, Kate and Stanley and decided to hike a trail marked on our old map.
 We started late morning on a wide equestrian trail and soon found churned up mud from the horses.

Although there were a few spots of this most of the trail was in excellent condition.

The fall flowers, especially asters, graced our stroll through the crown land and cow pies.

Eventually, we left our burbling brook

 and started climbing to the top of South Volcano Ridge.

The trees stopped and we could see our destination.

After lunch we climbed to the peak for a view -

and a photo.

We wanted to make a loop for the way back; our map showed this possibility, but our bushwhacking didn't cross another trail, just this spruce grouse.

So, still in good spirits, we agreed to go back the same way we had come. Going down was much easier and lots of fun. The trail had obviously been closed and/or rerouted over the years.