Tag: mountaineering

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Mt Cokely to Base of Mt Arrowsmith Gully

— Submitted by Clark Gourlay,

— Author Wanda Hill

ACC combined with Island Mountain Ramblers trip Apr 25, 2015. Traverse Mt Cokely to the Base of Mt Arrowsmith Gully and hike out climbers trail to the road. Organized and let by our fearless leader Clarke. Particpants included Clarke, Roger, Peggy, Monica, Wendy, Sandra and Wanda. We arrived to find loads of fresh snow. The trip took us 8 1/2 hours using various combinations of snow shoes and crampons. Thanks to Roger for breaking trail most of the way and Clarke for the excellent route finding. This route was moderately strenuous with beautiful scenery and some short steep and airy sections.

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Mt Arrowsmith’s Judge’s Route — First Hike of the Year!

Arrowsmith is, arguably, the most hiked mountain on Vancouver Island. I’m sure there are other hills that are more commonly hiked, Mt. Bension, Mt. Finlayson and even Mt. Tzouhalem come to mind. However, they are each below 1000 m. Arrowsmith, at 1819 m  (5967 ft), is just short of the magic 6k figure that would put it on the illustrious list of 6000 footers on Vancouver Island. Regardless, I consider Mt. Arrowsmith a great day hike. It offers multiple routes for those that are interested in varying degrees of  challenge.

Chute leading toward the summit
GPS Route with 30 Photographs

Total Distance: 7 km
Starting Elevation:  745 m
Maximum Elevation: 1819 m
Total Elevation Gain: 1100 m
Time: 6.5 hours

January 3rd, I joined the Island Mountain Ramblers, on the first hike of the year! In total 13 hikers, gathered to make the winter ascent of the commonly hiked Judges Route. Trail Peak has a good description of the route and detailed information about the hike.

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The Obscure Sadie Peak

— Submitted by Matthew Lettington, read the full report on his blog

View from the summit of Sadie Peak, looking North

Many of those who read my blog will know that I live in Nanaimo BC and that most of my hiking trips take me to the mid and north island. If you know your geography at all, you will also know that Nanaimo is wedged between the ocean and the mountains, a magical sort of place. However, that place is being held ransom by timber companies. The relationship between hikers and the land-holders is complicated. Though we would love to see the mountain left untouched, the reality is that most of the access to the peaks we want to climb is provided by the roads that are built and maintained by the forestry companies.

View GPS Route with photographs

Total Horizontal Distance: 11.4 km
Time: 8 hours
Starting Elevation; 885 m
Max Elevation: 1460 m
Total Elevation Gain: 1087 m

 In the past I have written of the challenges of getting into the areas around the Nanaimo Lakes Region.  I believe that many folks who live on the Vancouver Island have little concept of how the land owned by Island Timberlands has shaped their concept of where communities are located on the central Island.