Sat, Feb 28 2009 - Cox Hill and Ridge - North Approach (View Original Event Details)
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What do you do on an event when the coordinator can’t make it more than a few hundred metres for being sick and needs to turn around? Even with ditching the pack and redistributing stuff in other people’s packs, there simply was no strength. Well, with another coordinator on the event and experienced hikers (who can even read a compass), you send them along to take photos for you while you sleep in the car and look forward to the potluck at the end of the day. Thanks to David for leading the group, and thanks to Andra for the write-up below.
What started out as a rather cold morning at the car pool turned into a bright, sunny, warm six hours conquering Cox Hill and Ridge. After two hours of continuous climbing through a forest full of snow-covered trees along a faint path of where others had been long before the latest snowfall, we came to a wide opening on our left with a view of where we could see forever. This was the perfect spot for lunch! It was a clear blue sky with not even a breeze. We took about 30 minutes here to relax and refuel and rejuvenate! We made a phone call to Barbara and gave her a toast that she was doing O.K. Here, we thought we could see forever, little did we know what we were in for. We did the hill, now bring on the ridge! Along the way to the ridge, we had opportunities to see the city centre off in the distance. Once to the base of the climb to the ridge, we dropped our packs to lighten the load and then tackled the slow and steady switchback to the very top. Some visited both cairns at either end of the ridge. The scenery was amazing! We could plainly see Moose Mountain right in front of us, we saw wide open prairie, foothills and many more mountain peaks. Once back down to our base camp, we packed our stuff up for the trek back. By now it was 3:00 and we had our special dinner waiting for us back at the parking lot, so we made a bee-line back and arrived there by 4:30.
Everyone got creative for the potluck … food cooked by men, candles, and Dee even brought flowers to complete the table setting. A great way to end the day!