Banff National Park: Borgeau

Sometimes life just takes over. You may not realize just how busy you’ve been until you plop down on your bed and pick up the laptop to do anything but your Family Law readings (OK, maybe this doesn’t happen to everyone). Since my last post, I’ve gone to Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, Medicine Hat (X2), and BC. Also, I’ve started 2L (WTF?!) and school has already tightened it’s grip on me. AND I not only moved up to Edmonton again, but I’ve moved again since being in Edmonton to a new apartment.

Which brings me to the present. I should be doing my Family readings for tomorrow morning, but one of my friends that I’d barely seen this summer told me today that she loved my blog. And that got me thinking about how I’m a friggin’ terrible blogger and still haven’t posted about hikes I did in JUNE! And, I am a master procrastinator, perfect combo.

So rewind, all the way back to June. Imagine a crisp morning in the mountains and the snow hasn’t melted yet. In the car I have Jon and Justin, probably my fave hiking partners, and we are on our way to Borgeau for a quick jaunt up the mountain. This is the hike that inspired my blogging, the hike after which I wrote “Why blog? Why now?”. It was the crisp air, the snow in June, the chats with the boys that got me thinking, “this is good enough to share!”.

Exhibit A: Justin trudging along the trail.

The trailhead for Borgeau is a few kilometres past Banff heading West on the TransCanada from Calgary. The parking lot is on the South side of the highway, and pretty well marked. It is a decent grade, nothing too extreme but not a walk in the park either. It is a 7.5km hike one way, with some very very minor scrambles (real hikers, please don’t judge me for calling them scrambles).  The biggest hurdle on this hike was a) when it started to rain, b) making the snow covered avalanche paths hard and icy. This being said, June was so not the best time to do this hike. In hindsight, if you’re a casual hiker like me, wait until the snow melts.

Exhibit B: The snowed out trail. Well, not so much snowed out as avalanched out.

Nonetheless, it was a good hike. We got about 5.5km up the mountain when we realized that it wasn’t going to work with the rain and the snow. We weren’t prepared for the weather, and trudging through icy snow banks lost its allure the higher we got on the mountain. Being that we got well over halfway up, we still got some great views of the area.

Exhibit C: View from Borgeau

Also, being that I went with crazy boys we also stopped for lunch in the rain. There is a cute bridge over a little creek about halfway up so we sat for a snack and admired the view, and our sweet shoes.

Exhibit D: Some serious Vibram love going on here.

Exhibit F: The creek going down the mountain where we stopped for lunch.

Banff National Park: Borgeau

Distance: 7.5km to the top (one-way)

Difficulty: 7/10

Scenery: 8/10

Great for: climbing a mountain without extreme scrambles or extreme elevation gain. It is a little bit of a longer climb, but with a relatively small grade so your bum won’t hurt too much when you’re done.