Sun, Jul 4 2004 - Cirque Lake (was Galatea) (View Original Event Details)
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So I see by the writing on the wall that my penance for dishing out justified abuse and sarcasm is to write a highlight reel of our day's follies and accolades. Sooo, where to begin. Ahh yes, I must first apologize for my grammar, lousy sentence structure and extreme run on sentences, and as Cheryl says my "Simple" mind.
Now then, where to being again.....ahh yes...
The rain fell gently.
Ten anxious yet slightly cold travellers stood around their fearless leader as the seldom seen duo of Lana and Cheryl came to grace us with their presence. But unbeknownst to them the scent of fear was in the air as the weary travellers feared our exciting adventure was to be quelled by the weather spirits. Fortunately, the Weather Witch promised us good weather in the backcountry of the Great White North and assured us that our "Limping Switchback" friend wouldn't prevent, or slow, our journey (but, may take a spill or two into the mud. However, that spill would not prevent her from her renditions of children's classics for Ray's benefit).
So after our Dictator for Life arranged the vehicles, making sure that all the men, plus herself and Misa (who is leaving us. But I'll get into that later) were in the same vehicle. Oh, but of course, our red headed leader did have a cheesy excuse. ; ) We journeyed on to Lake Louise for pastry, coffee and a long lineup of tourists at the coffee house.
Then, to the troop's glee, a blue patch of sky was found and a nearby trail found worthy of our exploration. But, unbeknownst to this motley crew of hardened travellers, our feared, relentless and blood thirsty archenemies (no not Philip), the Mosquito, had also found and inhabited this marshy, dank, glacial run- off system. However, it was a very nice campground which even had, although there are no pictures to confirm it, a single bathroom with running water and get this, soap (not sure if the soap is scented). However, once again, this is unconfirmed by the men.
So, with a roughly 4 km hike through forests, over meadows, along roaring and rushing rivers, past spectacular Devonian and Cambrian Sandwich Mountains (each peaked with the hardened Eldon formation), over Potentilla Fruticosa and Artemisia Tridentata shrubs, under "Water falling from Trees, or multitudes of insects spontaneously jumping up and down on the lake" (but not raining) our slightly Mosquito-bitten group reached the end of the muddy path. A mighty 200 metre vertical climb (199 when Jen "Switchback" B was holding the GPS... sorry couldn't resist) was reached. Fortunately, our tired and wounded could enjoy a peaceful and relaxing lunch under the shadow of the glacier until someone happened to keep mentioning Broccoli Sprouts with decomposing fur-ridden Sour Cream. This of course prompted everybody into sharing their family secrets for culinary delights. With that being said, the debate raged over chocolate covered fish and, over course, different types of vomit. Ahhh where is Monty Python when you need them.
However, between these intellectual debates of philosophy we were fortunate to quietly watch an eagle carry home a fish for dinner. Or, as the peanut gallery noted, the bird was just taking the fish for a tour of the lake.
Then after a quiet and relaxing hike back to the cars we all witnessed a rare sight of a little red car displaying violent and evil types of road rage. Fortunately, she only had one throwing fit at the Kilkenny. This is where we all learned from "Rhonda" that Misa from Japan might be on her final hike as she's going to Montreal for the remainder of her stay in Canada. Fortunately, none of us had to dwell on this bad news as we got the terrible and tragic news from CNN that our Head Coordinator had a defective Boxty which led everybody into a panic over possible lugies in their food.
So, best of luck Misa, long live our touring friend the fish, howz the leg/blisters/muddy bottom Jen, hopefully we've helped out the endangered species of mosquito by donating our blood, and finally, provided each other with new ideas for cooking dinner.
-- Alan