Camping in the Canadian Rockies / an account of camp life in the wilder parts of the Canadian Rocky mountains, together with a description of the region about Banff, Lake Louise, and Glacier, and a sketch of early explorations.

by Walter Dwight Wilcox

Dr. Dawson says that the Stoney Indians have very few names for the mountains and rivers, and that they have only inhabited this region for about forty years. The greater part of the Indian names for various features of the country are in reality Cree or their equivalents in Stoney. The Stoneys have recently incorporated the families of the Mountain Crees with their own. According to De Smet, both the Crees and the Stoneys migrated southward from the Athabasca region a few years before 1849, and it is probable that they entered this region about that time.

I cannot conclude this digression on the Stoney Indians without quoting a few remarks from Captain Palliser’s reports. Though written nearly forty years ago these facts are no less true than at that time.

“The members of the Stone tribe are hard workers, as their life is one requiring constant exertion and foresight. They travel in the mountains or in the forests along their eastern base, in parties of six or seven families. The young men are always off hunting in search of moose or other kinds of deer, or of the Rocky Mountain sheep. The old men busy themselves cutting out the travelling tracks through the woods, while the women pack and drive the few horses they use for carrying their small supplies. They generally use skin tents stretched on a conical framework of poles, but their wigwams are much smaller than those of the Plain Indians. The women dress all the skins of the animals they kill into a soft leather, which, when smoked, is the material used throughout the whole country for making moccasins, most of the fine leather being obtained from the Stoneys. They are excellent hunters, and though as a rule small and feeble in body, are probably capable of more endurance than any other class of Indians. They make trustworthy guides, and, with a few exceptions, after some acquaintance with this tribe, you no more expect to be deceived, or told lies, as a matter of course, than you would in a community of white men.”

So much for the Rocky Mountain Stoneys, or as they are sometimes called, the Assiniboines.

The completion of our party did not take place at the wished-for time, and for more than two weeks Mr. F. and Mr. H., and I were alone at the chalet. We commenced our surveying work by measuring a very accurate base line on the lake shore, and began training by making various moderate excursions on the mountain sides. On the third day, however, after our arrival the whole plan of our party came near having a most sudden and unwished-for termination, together with results which nearly proved fatal to one of the party. The accident and its attendant circumstances proved the most exciting episode in all our experiences, and as it most clearly illustrates the chief danger of climbing in the Canadian Rockies, I shall describe it in detail.

It happened in this manner. On the 13th of July, Mr. H., Mr. F., and I started to make an exploration of the glacier that is plainly visible from the chalet and which, some two miles distant, flows down from the snow fields and hanging glaciers of Mount Lefroy. This glacier is formed from two branches, which come in from the east, and uniting into one great stream, terminate about one mile above the head of the lake. The extreme length from the snout measured to the highest part of the glacier is about three miles, while the average width is less than one third of a mile.

The object of this excursion was in great part to gain a little knowledge of the use of rope and ice-axe, which we expected would be required in much of our subsequent work. There was no difficulty in the first part of this excursion, as a good trail leads round the lake and some half-mile beyond. There we forded the icy stream which comes from the glacier and pursued our way between the moraine and the mountain side for nearly a mile on the east side of the glacier. Our next move was to ascend the moraine, which was very steep and about a hundred feet high at this point. On arriving at the sharp crest of the moraine, we saw the great ice stream some fifty feet below, and so thoroughly covered with debris and boulders that the glacier was almost totally concealed. The passage down the moraine was very disagreeable, as the loose stones all scratched and polished by their former passage under the glacier were now rolling from under our feet and starting up great clouds of dust. Just below, at the border of the glacier, the water from the melting ice had converted the clay of the moraine into treacherous pools of bluish-gray mud, veritable sloughs of despond. At length, by the use of our ice-axes, we gained the firmer ice and with it the advantage of far more pleasant walking. We found the whole surface of the glacier literally covered with sharp stones and boulders of all sizes up to those which must have measured ten feet square by twenty feet long. They represented all sorts of formations, shales, limestones, and sandstones thrown down in wild disorder over the entire surface of the ice. All this material had been wrested from the mountain side far up the valley by frost and avalanche, and was now slowly moving toward the great terminal moraine. In one place a large area of nearly half an acre was strewed with giant blocks of a peculiar kind of rock different from all the rest, which apparently had come thundering down the mountain walls in one great rock-slide many years ago. Large flat slabs of shale were seen here and there supported on pillars of ice, showing how much the general surface of the glacier had wasted away under the influence of the sun’s heat, while these pillars had been protected by the shade of the stone.

Advancing half a mile over the field of debris, we came gradually to where there were fewer stones, and at length reached almost pure ice. The question always arises where do all the boulders and pebbles that cover the lower parts of the glaciers come from? In the upper parts of the glaciers or névé regions, where the snow remains perpetual and increases from year to year, the stones from the mountain sides are covered as they fall, and are at length buried deep and surrounded by ice as the snow becomes compressed and solidified. As the glacier advances down the valley and descends to lower altitudes, a level is at length reached where the snowfall of winter is exactly balanced by the melting of summer. This is the snow line, or rather this is the best place in which to locate such a variable level. Below this line the surface of the glacier melts away more than enough to make up for the winter fall of snow, and, as a result, the stones and debris buried in the ice gradually appear on the surface. In the Canadian Rockies near this latitude the snow line on northerly exposures, as judged by this method, is about 7000 feet above the sea, which is also just about the level called tree line.

In mountainous regions, where the climate is very dry, as in Colorado or in certain parts of the Andes, there is a great belt of several thousand feet between tree line and snow line where there is not sufficient moisture to allow of tree growth nor sufficient snowfall to form glaciers at all. In the Canadian Rockies the climate is moist enough to make these lines approach, and in the Selkirk Range and regions of extreme humidity the snow line is actually lower than the tree line.

We advanced slowly over the glacier and found much of interest on every side. The surface of the ice was at first comparatively smooth and channelled with small streams of pure water which flowed along with utmost rapidity but almost without ripples, as the smooth icy grooves seem adapted to every whim of the flowing water. At length the ice became more uneven and our passage was interrupted by crevasses, around which we had to thread our way by many a turn and detour. Most of them were, however, partly filled or bridged by snow and we found no particular difficulty in pursuing our way. About one o’clock we found ourselves at the base of Mount Lefroy, a little beyond the point where the two branches unite, and we held a consultation as to the plan of our farther advance. Mount Lefroy rises from the glacier in precipitous cliffs on every side, and we were even now under the shadow of its gloomy and threatening rock wall. There is no apparent method of scaling this mountain except by a long couloir or snow slope, which rises from the glacier and ascends nearly 1000 feet to a more gentle slope above the precipice. It was our intention to ascend this mountain, if possible, some time during the summer but the results of our first exploration for a favorable route rather inclined us to give up further attempts.