Aug. 23rd - Aug. 24th, Yoho Valley

We drove in the morning from Golden to Takkakaw Falls in the Yoho Valley and arrived there around 11am. From the parking lot we hiked to Laughing Falls campground which is about two-thirds into Yoho Valley counted from Takkakaw Falls. The way is relatively flat (maybe 100m elevation or so) and to a large degree also wide. Once we arrived there we build up the tent and had lunch. Since the day was nice and still plenty of time left we decided to go up towards Little Yoho Valley or towards Whaleback Highline just for the fun of it. Our main plan was to do the Iceline trail back to Takkakaw Falls the next day. We headed out with little luggage around 2:30pm and ended up at the top of the Whaleback Highline around 4:15pm after about 400m elevation upwards. It was very scenic up there but a bit cloudy/misty. As it turned out this cloudiness was just the first sign of the massive fire haze covering up all mountains in the area during the next days to the point that we left the area and headed north. Once we were up at the Whaleback Highline we decided to return back via Twin Falls (top and bottom) and then via Yoho valley to Twin Falls. We were back around 7:15pm at Laughing Falls to make dinner. A nice and somewhat unplanned 5h tour.

Yoho Valley: View back towards Takkakaw Falls

Yoho Valley: Hiking towards Laughing Falls campground

On our way up to the Whaleback Highline. The path up switched-back steeply for the last 200m elevation gain. The Highline trail starts at the top of the rock in the upper left of the picture.

View across Yoho Valley towards Mt. Niles. We did not know it by then, but the mist here is actually a fire haze which originated in Washington State (USA)

View of Vice President and President mountains across Little Yoho Valley on the way up. The Iceline trail runs from left to right between the forest line and the glaciers in the stony/pebbly area.

Whaleback Highline: View into the formerly glaciated portion of Yoho Valley and Wapta Icefield

Whaleback Highline: Mt. Balfour

Whaleback Highline: Yoho Peak (right) and Mont des Poilus or Arete Peak (middle)

 

Whaleback Highline: Mt. Balfour

Whaleback Highline: Mt. Balfour

Even more Mt. Balfour pictures ...

Whaleback Highline: View towards south east with Mt. Niles

President Range from Whaleback Highline

 

Heading downwards again into Waterfall Valley toward the top of Twin Fall

Mt. Balfour in the evening sun

The bridge at top of Twin Falls

The Bridge at the top of Twin Falls

View across Yoho Valley to Mt. Balfour from Twin Falls bridge

Looking down at the Twin Falls cliff to Twin Falls Chalet and the bottom of the falls

View of Yoho Valley from Twin Falls top

A porcupine crosses the way

Twin Falls creek on our way back to Laughing Falls

Yoho River on our way back to Laughing Falls

Laughing Falls

The next day was a mess. Early on I looked out of the tent and it was very cloudy. To the point that I was not sure if the Iceline trail was possible. I decided to sleep a bit longer. One hour later the fog was still not gone and I decided that we would likely not do the Iceline trail. I did not want to be up there in foggy (and possibly wet) circumstances. But somehow the weather felt funny because it wasn't so wet at all. Anyway we decided to postpone the Iceline trail and hike out to Takkakaw falls. If the weather was good tomorrow then we would simply do Iceline trail the other way round.

On our way from Laughing Falls to Takkakaw we met more hiking people. I was told that what I thought was mist and fog was in fact a fire haze which was blown north west from the US by the prevailing winds. When I heard this things suddenly made a lot more sense. It explained also why we had seen yesterday already quite a bit of mist when doing the Whaleback Highline, especially compared to the blue sky the day before at Emerald Lake. I dediced to stay the night at Takkakaw Falls campground and try to attempt Iceline the next day if conditions improved. I taught Margaret, Anna and Tobi the whole day more or less how to play "skat" (a German card game).