Club Events 2005 : 2005-01-22 : COC - Barrier Fire Lookout via Prairie View Trail

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Trip Log

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What started off with quite a bit of chaos turned out to be a fabulous day. First of all, the event was originally posted as a snow shoe on the new Canyon snow shoe trail, but due to rain and warm temperatures, our snow pack in Peter Lougheed was decimated, so the event was changed to a Prairie View Hike. Second, some of our group were supposed to go out to do some trail maintenance today with the Friends of Kananaskis, but that was cancelled due to road conditions on the Smith Dorrien. So, that group was invited to join us for our hike instead. All but one took us up on the invitation.

So, we had a fantastic day with some great Chinook winds (I hiked a good part of the day with my outer layers removed - I was in my shirt with the sleeves rolled up). The trail had some ice, some snow, some muck, and some slog. What does that mean? I don't really know, but whatever it is, we had plenty of it. The views more than made up for it anyway.

Nine hearty souls made it all the way to the lookout, with several more making it at least up to where the solar panel is. Five or so, who took their time enjoying the views on the way up (that's our story and we're stickin' to it), stopped once they reached the first good open area with a view down to Barrier Lake.

Rendezvousing back at the parking lot, we decided that we all needed to go buy lottery tickets because of three miraculous losses and recoveries:
- Corinne's hiking pole basket caught up with her via another hiker at carpool
- Ralph's right ice cleat caught up with him via Teresa at carpool
- Jeanne's left mitt caught up with her on the trail via Rhonda

A stellar day which, naturally, ended up with beer and wings at the Kilkenny.

-- Rhonda
PS... if anyone sees John, tell him he owes me $5 for the carpool arrangements...


Photos