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Morrison Spire and Fossil Hunting
Strathcona Provincial Park
Wednesday, July 29
We had been a bit bagged from our long hike up from Buttle Lake, and we'd decided to splurge a bit with sleep - we arose well after the sun, perhaps around 8 a.m. Adhering nicely to the forecast, the day dawned clear and blue, and the sun was shining brightly. Here in our camp, however, it was still cool. We were still in shade, shielded by some bluffs.
Morning at Wheaton Lake
Morning at Wheaton Lake
The Food Stash
We had had three tentative objectives for our time in the Marble Meadows area: Mount McBride - the highest of the nearby mountains; Marble Peak; and Morrison Spire - whose distinctive three-humped point was directily visible to us from camp. In all cases, we planned to achieve these summits as a day-hike from our Wheaton Lake campsite. Of these three, Mount McBride was the highest and longest objective, and Marble Peak would require a bit of a backtrack back the way we'd come in. We soon settled, therefore, on Morrison Spire - it was shorter (in both distance and height) than McBride, and it offered us new terrain to explore, rather than re-treading over ground we'd just been on. Given our late get-up time, this was the best choice.

The other factor, of course, was Arn's branch-injured eye. Disturbingly, he was still seeing double-vision with it, although he reported that there was no discomfort or pain. We discussed whether or not it would be prudent to cut short our backpack and head back to civilization, where he could have it properly examined. However, after some discussion, Arn felt that it wasn't quite serious enough to warrant that, and continuing with our agenda for today was his preferred course of action.
Breakfast at Wheaton Lake
Towards the Spire
Morrison Spire
We spent a relaxed morning getting ready at camp. With the objective of Morrison Spire now set, we felt there was no particular reason to rush. The rough hiking/climbing distance from our camp to the top seemed to be, by our estimate, no more than 4 or 5 kilometres, and with an elevation gain of roughly 1300-1600 feet. Both of these values seemed fairly mild and easily accomplished - even in half a day.

After a shady and cool breakfast next to our tents, we spent the next little while admiring the pristine view from camp. The little slice of Marble Meadows we were camped in had not so much as a mountainous feel to it as it did a "rugged terrain" feel. The land on the far side of the lake was almost entirely bare, craggy bedrock, with a sprinkling of trees here and there, and further in the distance were a few low, sharp cliffs. The only thing truly mountainous that was visible from the lakeshore was Morrison Spire, and even then it was only a fairly small prominence set along the horizon. As far the 'pristine' part of the view went, a large portion of that was attributable to Lake Wheaton itself. With the bright backlit morning sun, the clarity of its blue-and-turquoise water was striking. We could easily see every rock and pebble on the near floor of the lake's bed.
Gem of a Lake
Pristine Water, Rock and Sky
Warming up
As 10 a.m. approached, we lazily decided that we should get our day underway. We did another round of Arn-eye-inspections, finding nothing conclusive except how a human eyeball can be quite reflective.
How's the eye?
Is there a scratch?
The world from Arn's eye
We gathered up our extra camp food and brought it up with us to the nearby Wheaton Hut. We decided that the best place to safely store our surplus food for the day was in our steel-mesh food bag, stored locked in the hut in the larder area.
Budding
The sunny view from camp
Heading out for the day
With our food safely stashed at the Wheaton Hut, we set out on our journey towards Morrison Spire. After reading several descriptions of the route, we understood the general plan: follow a herdpath leading west from the Wheaton Hut, following a neck of land that connected Marble Meadows to the McBride-Morrison ridgeline, then turn south on the ridgeline for a short distance until we reached Morrison Spire. Supposedly, the "back-side" (west side) of the spire (unlike the "front side", which was vertical cliff) was an easy slope.
courtesy JInnes
Wheaton Hut
Limestone and Gravel
Chunk of Limestone
We quickly located a fairly distinctive herdpath that led west behind the hut. It traversed diagonally upwards - also good - because we wanted to gain the crest of Wheaton Ridge, the arm of land that extended west towards our objective.

We followed the path, passing through a few stretches of forest interspersed with open areas. These areas had an interesting combination of bright orange gravel and outcrops of brilliant white limestone. Several sinkholes were also present.
Climbing to Wheaton Ridge
McBride comes into view
Broad, wide view
Fifteen minutes of easy uphill hiking brought us to the crest of Wheaton Ridge, where an excellent view of the southeast face of Mount McBride presented itself. After stopping to admire the view, we angled left, following the crest of the ridge as it lost elevation. The herdpath became somewhat indistinct here, winding through a stretch of person-high scrubby trees dotted along the ridgecrest.
courtesy JInnes
courtesy BConnell
Examining McBride
Limestone and McBride
Wheaton Ridge
The well-defined crest of Wheaton ridge faded away into a broader height of land as we continued. The herdpath, occasionally marked by cairns, wound through and over a rather rough landscape, full of little crags and outcrops of limestone. Eyes needed to be kept peeled for some sign of the bootpath or a cairn.
courtesy BConnell
Examining the Outcrops
Examining the Outcrops
Another Contrasting View
As we neared the low point of the neck of land connecting Marble Meadows to the McBride-Morrison ridge, the herdpath re-entered intermittent forest and began a descent off to the west. At first we thought it was a minor dip, but the path continued down, down, down. We started to wonder if in fact we were on the right path, since this extra (and unwanted) elevation loss didn't really need to occur, according to the topo. We stuck with it, though, and presently the trail made a sharp right-hand turn and began to steeply climb back up north - but not without having handed us a couple of extra hundred feet of elevation gain.
courtesy BConnell
Sometimes Obvious...
Unwanted Descent
Spire getting closer
As we climbed back upwards - often scrambling over steep little outcrops and bluffs, we began to parallel a pretty little creek, cascading and burbling down the mostly bare bedrock. We could tell from the stains on the rock that this creek was often flowing much more strongly - we were only seeing a mild, quiescent version of itself today.
Mountain Meltwater
Small, wet meadow
Lunchtime
The ups-and-downs of the rugged little herdpath and the sunny, windless day had us fairly overheated by the time noontime arrived. We parked ourselves in the shade of a convenient stand of trees and had a good, long lunchbreak. Next on our agenda was the climb up to the ridgeline, along with a bit of fossil hunting.
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