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Observation Peak |
| Elevation 3174m Height Gain Time to Reach Summit Degree of Difficulty Scenery Date of Most-recent Ascent |
- Original
description and photos courtesy My first comments are of great thanks to Alan Kane and his book, "Scrambles in the Canadian Rockies". Without his detailed instructions, I would never have heard of, nor likely attempted any scramble. He truly deserves much credit......therefore, I'd suggest that you purchase his book and read his instructions and associated photos of the ascent routes. This particular peak is located directly across from Bow Summit on the Icefields Parkway. One of the first things that I noticed was that there was a distinct lack of any trail, but bushwacking is really not an issue due to the short approach. I generally followed Mr. Kane's ascent route except that I started in the avalanche zone north of his route. Above tree line I angled south to regain his route directly below the short cliffs he describes. At the cliffs, angle right on ledges following the small cairns for 75 meters or so, then choose a suitable very minor gully and angle up and left to regain the scree slope above the cliffs. March up the rubble to the false summit then traverse northwest to reach the true summit. Once below the short cliffs mentioned earlier, I descended following the more northernly gully. The photo of the summit cornice is taken midway between the false and true summit. As Mr. Kane advises, there are large cornices which overhang the east side of this entire ridge. At the time of this outing it was very easy to avoid any snow. Although I am not an expert, I would certainly advise scramblers to stay off the cornices. The views were excellent and despite the temperature change (+20C at trailhead, +5C at the Summit) and howling winds it was a very enjoyable outing.
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