Mountain height

Tombstone South – August 16, 2004

Mountain height:      3,000 m (9,842 feet)
Elevation gain:          1,020 m
Ascent time:             6:20
Descent time:           4:00

Scrambling with Linda Breton.

I first bumped into Linda while descending from the Mount Bourgeau summit two years ago. Somewhere along the way I lost my St. Louis Rams ball-cap and Linda was kind enough a pick it up and leave it at the trailhead. Two years later she stumbled onto my website, realized I was the guy who lost the cap and so she contacted me. I, unfortunately never did recover the cap, but we managed to arrange a mountain trip together (Linda lives in Saskatoon ) – and our choice of Tombstone Mountain – South, turned out to be a terrific scramble, with great scenery, and some bizarre weather.

Starting out under relatively clear skies, we made our way to scenic Elbow Lake and then on towards Tombstone Mountain . Crossing Elbow River and Piper Creek without getting our feet wet was a little more challenging than expected, but we managed to find a couple of decent places to cross. We then started up the south ridge of Tombstone and as Alan Kane suggests, the best route stays right on the crest as much as possible. Along the ridge, the terrain was interesting, varied, and there were plenty of opportunities for some decent hands-on scrambling. Thankfully, we were expecting quite a few false summits and so none of them really came as a surprise.

We spotted the rockband that Kane describes, from quite a distance and so we traversed low on the slopes and then ascended back to the ridge to the last false summit, just beyond the strip of brown coloured rock. The view from this summit was great and the terrific drop down the east side of the mountain equally breath-taking. A short hike, right along the edge of the ridge, took us to the true summit, and yet another amazing panorama. Most impressive were craggy Tombstone Mountain North and the spiky Mount Jerram . Elpoca Mountain to the southwest and Mount Rae to the south were also quite dominant.

Throughout the latter part of the ascent we had watched clouds forming all around us and now, at the summit, it became quite clear we were in for some violent weather. Given that, we quickly packed up and started the optional descent, down the southwest scree slopes. This alternate route was a welcome change, offering a rapid descent on sections of good, surfable scree. Near the top, a couple of loud thunderclaps prompted us to quicken our pace. About one-third of the way down, we got caught in a hailstorm and had to take shelter behind a couple of rockwalls. Lower down we encountered a very small waterfall which, because of the rain and hail, practically tripled in size right before our eyes.

Throughout the descent, we witnessed some breath-taking weather phenomena: clouds and mist forming at the valley bottom and rising rapidly all around us; periods of white-outs followed by clear skies; the sun reflecting of the wet rock; dark, foreboding clouds creeping over the mountain tops; and of course, the requisite share of lightning and thunder. The interesting weather and different scenery (than on the way up), made for a more than fascinating descent. Linda, who did the entire descent in considerable pain, from a chronic knee problem, was fantastic and didn’t complain about it once – her positive attitude and refusal to let the pain and discomfort interfere with her enjoyment of the trip and the mountains in general was very a huge inspiration to me and certainly made me thankful for my own good health. I was also very impressed that she, and others, would drive all the way from Saskatoon to experience the magnificent Rockies .

Eventually, we found a well-worn trail, running down the valley, and followed it back over Piper Creek and the Elbow River to the main trail. Near the bank of the Elbow River , I found a can of Bear Spray and thinking it was empty, I carelessly took of the safety clip of pulled the trigger. It was not empty and the violent blast of pepper spray scared the living daylights out of both of us and had out lungs burning within seconds. Thankfully, it was not serious and we had a good laugh over the incident.

At Elbow Lake , we were caught in another rainstorm that soon turned into fair sized hail. Even though we were still wearing our helmets, the hail was big enough sting quite a bit on impact and we took shelter in the trees. By the time we got back to the car, we were both soaked through to the skin, as were our backpacks. We finished the day with a pleasant meal at The Drake, in Canmore. Overall, a fantastic day – good scrambling, great scenery, wicked weather, and awesome company.