June 25 2015
Rowe Lake (Upper and Lower)
Princess Kananaskis and I ended up in Waterton National Park and much to our amazement it’s the most amazing mountains we’ve ever been to!! Sunbeams streaming through the evening air through mountain crests. And ducks on the ponds as they reflect the peaks and sky crystal clear.
We drive along the Akamina toward the trailhead. Small, thick, fluffy clouds emerge from the sky behind the outlines of the peaks. The temperature rises, +22 at 9:30 AM, its gonna be hot. We arrive at the trailhead and set off into the forest. Beargrass and juniper. We encounter a stream with red rocks that seem to glow beneath the icy water. We ascend through the dry, sharp scent of pine and spruce to open patches in avalanche slopes at mid valley where cool airy flows down from the upper valley with its lakes. Then upward, past Lower Rowe Lake with its legions of flies, along the brook with rock gardens to the meadows where a colosseum of cliffs lead to Lineham Ridge.
The final push, we trudge through Glacier Lillies and Larch to Upper Rowe Lake. Winding time back to spring, the crocuses are out. The wind greets us in huge, washing gusts from the peaks and sky as the clouds float by close enough to touch.
We sublimed on the shoreline for an hour or so and cooled our legs in the waters before descending back along a babbling brook in an endorphine blazed pace, back to the car.
Waterton Blisss.
KK
.gpx track for the Rowe Lake Hike for your GPS device (download here)
Crossing Rowe Creek along a plank, multi hued red stones.
Rowe Creek. Fish view.
Emerging between Subalpine Furs and Englemenn’s into the upper meadow
Upper Meadow Panorama before the trudge to Upper Rowe Lake
Upper Rowe Lake (Sept 2016)
