 Mount
Field
- Canadian Rockies
3:01 PM Friday
Sept 20 2002
H and I just made it to the summit of Mt. Field by way of the
Burgess Shale trail and then the N.W. ridge.
The
scrambling was good on firm rock. When we first
looked at it from the top of the approach we weren't sure.
The route looked gnarlier near the end.
It was a bit gnarly but the crux was a small
wall composed of solid steps with good and ample holds.
Anything to say
H?
Uhmmm.... not at this
second..... No.
OK that's what will
go in then....
Humum bumehmnnn ...
Laugh
You're writing down what I said?
Yup
H rates it a good
junior climb ... mind you he adds ....we senior with our ..... You're
going to write down everything?
Next time though, I'm
bringing more film. I missed a few shots of scrambles though some
pinnacles and also a view of Emerald Lake from the Burgess High
Line. The sun broke through the clouds and shone directly upon the
lake bringing out one the finest blues to be had.
7:46 PM
The bulgur will
be ready in 10 minutes so I can write some more.
The way down was more
difficult than Kane's book would suggest. Lots of loose rubble; no
real trail through the scree like some of the moderates and
difficult scrambles.
The trick is to find
the cairn to get through the upper rock band. All considered I think a
moderate rating would be more appropriate. After all there is a
small amount of route finding to get through this loose rock band as
I could not see the cairn until I had traversed over a ways. When I
saw it, I hollered out to H that the band pass was over here. He left
the steep and rotten cliffs he was about to go down.
Shudder ....
The next morning saw
us pack our gear and enjoy breakfast with and also be the
beneficiaries of a complementary speech by the local resident
geologist. He was giving a preamble to a group on their way to visit
the Burgess Shale quarry on the slopes of Mt. Field.
One of
the nice young women on the tour approached me sitting at the
picnic table next to Yoho Lake. I mentioned that H and I had mistakenly stumbled
upon the UNESCO World Heritage Site by accident on our way to the
summit of Mt. Field.
The speech given by
the tour guide was great.
The era that is displayed in the formation
of the Burgess Shale is a fascinating topic and even though the
fossils are extremely old, indistinct, and laying on the side of a
mountain virtually unprotected; they have created a certain resonance with
me.
Mountain Photography
> < |
|
Mount Stephen has an exposure too....
The Burgess Shale that is..... |
This geological
boundary represents the
beginning of the explosion of multi-cellular life forms that have
visited the Earth since the beginning of the Cambrian period,
possibly the most important time in the history of the Earth.
What a fantastic
spot!!!!!
CANADIAN MOUNTAIN PANORAMAS
|
| Mountain / Image |
Java |
VRML |
Jpg |
Size |
28. Mt. Field
 |
Java |
VRML |
JPG |
306k |
 magine
spending four billion years stocking the oceans with seafood,
filling the ground with fossil fuels, and drilling the bees in honey
production -- only to produce a race of bed-wetters!
Barbara
Ehrenreich
1941-, American Author, Columnist
 he
earth is not a mere fragment of dead history, stratum upon stratum
like the leaves of a book, to be studied by geologists and
antiquaries chiefly, but living poetry like the leaves of a tree,
which precede flowers and fruit -- not a fossil earth, but a living
earth; compared with whose great central life all animal and
vegetable life is merely parasitic. Its throes will heave our
exuviate from their graves.
Henry
David Thoreau
1817-1862, American Essayist, Poet, Naturalist
©
CanadasMountains.com + Tim L. Helmer
Friday February 08, 2008 11:29 AM
|
