Oct 17th, Skaha Bluffs

Fooled me again…this was supposed to be a moderate 5km walk in the park close to home ( its a mere 10 minutes from where home is currently parked…..we can see it from our windows.)

It was a loop walk, which looked fairly easy on the map with an advertised 268 m elevation gain. Should let us stretch our legs we thought………we missed the significance of the ‘bluffs’ bit….

( It was also the first hike with Scotts new camera……so most of the images are now taken with a camera rather than just a phone……we will see how that turns out…!!! )

It starts with winding, snaking single track road up to the parking lot in Skaha Bluffs Provincial Park.

This was a Sunday, we usually avoid weekends, and the parking lot was jammed full so it was going to be busy…ah well…we were there so lets get on…

Easy well cut trail at start….and starts to climb……first bluff Scott wanted to veer off onto another trail….( cos it looked interesting….!!! Editor 🤷‍♂️)….so we headed around the rock face and on up the trail….we spied some climbers in action with all the gear and ropes.

Turns out ( my pre-hike research skills are apparently lacking..😂) that Skaha Bluffs is one of the premiere rock climbing parks in Canada…!!! (https://www.mountainproject.com/area/105946462/skaha )

I know…I’m saying it again….but this trail turned in to an unexpected beauty…yet another very different and quite spectacular landscape……..

I called it quits at the 50 m mark on the ledge along the rock face…..I’m quite sure it was do-able for some one braver than me…!!…..but more than I was prepared to do…back we went to find another way around.

There were lots of little 2 to 5 m climbs…not an easy path……

But the rewards…(the views )…delivered as they always seem to manage to do….!!!

The way back down was a bit challenging also. The reverse of the little rock climbs up…were, of course, little rock climbs (or little muddy butt slides…!!!) down.

Weaving our way down it was laugh out loud crazy at times as we faced the rock filled gully….it was like Turtle Mountain meets Grotto Canyon……!!!

Towards the bottom of the rockiest bits we met up with some climbers that were done for the day. They seemed to know the way so we followed them down for a bit. It was exciting…!!!!😮

Many of the paths ended in cliff faces. With hindsight……..because it’s a rock climbers paradise…..!!!

It was a bit of a relief to get back on more level ground….but it was a thoroughly enjoyable day (for a recovery walk…!!!😂)

The next adventure……and workout for the new camera…was Nickel Plate park up in the clouds past Apex mountain.

Extra Pix