Sunday, August 19, 2012

Brandywine Mountain

On Saturday I set out to hike Brandywine Mountain near Whistler. With the highway construction of the 2010 winter olympics, I was following the wrong directions in my scrambles book, but with some determination we finally found the trailhead. It's always thrilling exploring a new hike, anticipating new views over every ridge and mountain pass. This hike definitely did not disappoint! The views from the gorgeous meadows to the magnificant peaks were spectular. There was still considerable snowpack on this hike so we ended up taking a different ascent route up to the summit than what was suggested in my hiking guide. It took us about 5 hours to summit. Apparently the name of the mountain comes from a bet between 2 railway surveyors as they contiplated the height of Brandywine Falls betting a bottle of brandy against a bottle of wine. After hiking about 1.5 kilometres in the forest following a river you reach the meadows with wide open views of beautiful peaks. I was surprised the grass wasn't longer but this meadow has probably only been snowfree for a couple weeks. The meandering streams crisscrossing throughout the valley made for some nice pictures. I promised myself never to drink untreated water after suffering from beaver fever in alberta, but I just couldn't resist this mountain fresh water...it sure beat the luke warm water I was drinking out of my camel pack! There was still loads of snow in the valleys, and we couldn't figure out where we were in comparison to the picture in my hiking guide, so we scrambled up to this summit thinking it was Brandywine Mountain. Once we reached that summit, we realized that Brandwine was that peak way out yonder in the distance... The craggly peaks in the distance were amazing! I'd like to know the name of the prominant spiney ridge in the background of this shot.