Friday, (Canada Day!)

Burr…. I found it cold last night (it was 4’ throughout the night), is it not summer?? We are in the mountains, I guess this explains the weather!!! Same routine in the morning wake the Scouts early, make and eat breakfast, back a snack in day packs (Thanks for the Donation Andrew & Jen for the Cliff Energy Bars).

Ice fields & museum was our first planned activities for this day, so we all loaded up in the vehicles and drove to site.  I must say that at this site we saw snowflakes and I was wondering why I hadn’t packed a warmer jacket, mitts and toque.  I guess when I read optional on the packing list I thought its SUMMER why would I need those?????? (Silly me…… I will pack differently the next time I head in that direction).   

We all hike up to as far as we could to see the ice fields.  The Scouts thought is was cool to see the signs that stated where the ice field was in earlier years driving up & hiking up to where is was today. What was also interesting was the flow of water just below of the ice field, this was the melt off heading down stream.  Some pictures were taken and off to the museum we went.  Wasn’t a very big museum but some good information was there in the history of the park. 

With a 2:30ish tram ride pre-booked we need to get back to our campsite to have a quick lunch and pack an afternoon snack and drink for the afternoon activities.

This afternoon was a start of at least one exhausted Leader (ME!). When one says, “oh let’s take the tram ride up most of the mountain and then says we are going to hike up the rest of the way to the top of Whistler Mountain”……..I’m thinking to myself how hard can this be??? About a quarter of the way up I’m now thinking……”HOW OUT OF SHAPE I AM!!!” As most of the Scouts are trotting up the mountain not phased in the least and with others struggling a bit to get to the top!  Just when one thought they were at the top, you would get over the peak and find another steep section that needed to be climbed.  I had many encouraging words from strangers….. It’s not that much father……you can do it….. It’s just one more peak to go……you can do it!!!! All Scouts did an awesome job accomplishing their own individual mountain peaks for that day.  Once up one must hike back down!!!!

To think we did more after this jammed pack day…….back to camp for dinner and a bit of a rest, then back into town for Canada Day fireworks.  Fireworks show was a good one for a small town that lasted a good 20 to 30 minutes.  Needless to say that this was a late evening with everyone finally getting to bed at midnight, all going to bed knowing that we had a early rise the next day for our rafting adventure early morning.  All Scouts feel asleep quickly this evening.