Lawson, south end | Trip Reports | Kananaskis Outdoors Forum

Lawson, south end

Add a New Topic

Reply to Post

User

Post

1:06 pm
August 23, 2010

Bob Stebbins

Calgary

Member

posts 31

Quote and Reply

Print this Post

Post edited 1:11 pm – August 23, 2010 by Bob Stebbins

On Sunday 22 August 2010 we tackled the south end of Mt. Lawson, going the entire distance to the second summit. Gillean’s description of this trail is, as usual, very good, and there is no need to repeat it here. To be added to that description are the following: 1) Our GPS recorded an elevation gain of 665m from the gate on the TransAlta road to the second summit, not the 762m shown in the guidebook. 2) The first summit raises 588m from the trail head at the gate. 3) We believe we found at GR312190 the Y-junction mentioned on p. 307. We followed it for around 30m, and it conformed to Gillean’s description.

The views available in approximately the final one-third of the trail are extraordinary. Furthermore the trail itself is, in this section, most interesting and fun to walk. Before then you are firmly in the trees, however, constantly plodding upward with little else to see than the forest itself and whatever wildlife it presents at the moment (for us mostly birds). As for the initial 0.7k on the TransAlta road, I’d rather do it as quickly as possible on a bike. But, then, I’ve been over it several times on snowshoes.

5:48 pm
September 24, 2011

RyderDA

Canmore

Member

posts 70

Quote and Reply

Print this Post

We headed up there today, Sept 24, and had the place to ourselves on a spectacular fall day. Compare this to the Galatea trailhead where there were cars parked up and down the road. There wasn't a cloud in the sky and it was 24°. The larches at the top of Kent Ridge across the valley were magnificent. The few larches at the top of the lower summit were wonderful.

We could not find the "Y" noted on P. 307 going up or coming down (not that it mattered because we weren't interested in heading up that way). Some flagging or a cairn would be nice if someone does find it.

We built a small cairn at the best point to leave the road to aid in trail finding (we thought the crossing was close to the dam; it's not). The route is pretty obvious and flagged a lot of the way. If you lose it (and we did a few times on the way up), it's not hard to find because the forested ridge is only about 10 m wide, with a cliff on the east and a steep drop on the west.

We did not make it to the second summit. We started up the scree just past the photo on P. 307 and it looked just like the photo on P. 308. The exposure was not pleasant, with a 50° sscree slope on one side and a cliff on the other, and while the scree was fairly stable, there was too much crawling on all fours for us. Having just finished reading "A Hiker's Guide to Scrambling Safety" that said we had gone to 5th class terrain and we were not interested in continuing. Downclimbing the scree was slow and arduous.

I would argue the steepest (ad least stable) section is in fact the first 20 m height gain after leaving the road, followed by a 30 m pull up a 55° grass slope near the lower top.

This hike reminded me of Hunchback Hills, though this trail is easier to find and to follow.

See photos and more on my blog here.

Page: 1

Reply to Post