To The Top of Vancouver Island: The Golden Hinde

All too soon, however, the need to prepare ourselves for the rigours of the next day became all too apparent and we were early to bed.

Friday, August 24; summit day

No getting up late on this morning. We were up before the sun and away down at just after 6.30. It’s not too often you get to start summit day with a 450 metres descent. Nevertheless, down the north ridge of Burman we went, gently at first before plummeting down the vertical mud and the tree root “ladder” the last 100 metres into the chasm at the foot of the ridge. Just prior to this, I had a lucky escape.

The snag that nearly did me in!

In the Burman chasm

South bowl & tarn

Hinde S face

There was no way to see this one coming. The merest touch on a snag on the uphill side of the route sent it hurtling down on me. It must have been in the most precarious of equilibriums. I literally threw myself ahead of it down slope and to one side. It brushed my legs as it went by before coming to rest a few metres downhill. Pure instinct on my part and a good job too. Without it this trip was over and maybe a lot worse.

In any event, we took this in our stride, as one must, carried on down the chasm, up the other side, which is much less steep, and out onto the open ridge coming off the south side of the Hinde. Easy walking with a couple of nice breaks got us to the (frozen) tarn in the bowl under the south face of the mountain at 9.20am.

Up the lower south face we went, on scree at first and then soft snow, aiming for the exit gully at the top right hand corner of the lower face before it goes vertical. 

Climbing the lower south face

Traversing under the SE face

Climbing the SE gullies

Approaching the summit

We found the gully with no problem, climbed it and crossed the shoulder onto the southeast face. We then made a rising traverse east across the face, again partly on scree and partly on snow and arrived at the bottom of the SE gullies at 10.40.

We took the second gully. It was partly snow filled. The bottom snow section looked steep, narrow and rotten. So we stayed well away from that on rock to climber’s right. The upper section, which ran up almost to the snow saddle between the west and main summits looked much more user friendly but ran out to into its steep, narrow and rotten cousin below. So, not having brought rope or pro, we avoided that too and continued on rock to the right. Difficulties were no more than easy 4th Class and soon brought us to a point just below the crest of the snow saddle. Here I advocated a near horizontal traverse to the right behind an obvious sub-summit and from the end of this traverse, we could see the main summit above and back left. A few minutes on the final boulder field and it was done. My altimeter showed 2,205 metres. The true altitude is anywhere from 2195 to 2200, depending on your source, but at least we knew the pressure was remaining constant. High fives and hugs and a well earned rest.
         
Superlative views! What an understatement! The Golden Hinde lies right in the centre of Strathcona – in fact right in the centre of Vancouver Island – it’s the highest point, so of course the views are superlative and of course they’re 360°. Cloud to the north unfortunately obscured about 60° of arc (which included Victoria and Warden Peaks) but all the peaks that, over the years, have become as familiar as old friends were well and truly there. Mt Colonel Foster, Elkhorn, Alexandra Peak, Mt Albert Edward, the peaks around the Comox Glacier, Septimus, Myra, Big Interior, Tom Taylor, Thelwood and on and on and on - including our whole line of march over the last three days. 

Far below us, on the slopes of Mt Burman, our tent reflected the afternoon sun and looked a long long way away!

On the summit we found the original second survey plate from 1937, a host of prayer flags, a new summit register and the inevitable and illegal memorial plaque to some poor soul who had died in the mountains. Unlike the ones on Victoria Peak and Elkhorn, this one is actually bolted in place. Now I applaud the sentiment that put this there. This guy loved the mountains and now he’s amongst them forever. But do we have to tell the world about it? What if we all did it? Especially as the second and subsequent plaques would just have to be bigger than the first. And what gives one family the right to “bag” the Hinde over another? Parks’ policy in banning such items is hard but fair. Knowing our government, I can see the day when they’ll sell summit space for this purpose but, in the meantime, let’s just leave our summits as pristine as they were meant to be shall we? And that includes no prayer flags I’m afraid.

Off in the distance to the east we could see the ski runs on Mt Washington. There’s a cellular repeater tower up there and sure enough and for the only time on the trip, we had a signal. Calls to the wives let them know of our success and assured them we were fine but also brought the news that the weather was changing for the worse.

We were running behind schedule if we were to get back to the food cache at Carter Lake that night but how often do you get to visit such a place? So we lingered over lunch and lingered some more and then, just for a change, lingered over taking photos. So, all in all, we didn’t start down until almost 2pm. 

The descent was problem free. The gullies have lots of loose rock but it can be managed if one is careful. We were out and onto the SE face at 2.55 and at the bottom of the south face by 3.50. Down into the chasm right at the mosquito witching-hour of 4.30 and then a slow plod back up the ridge to the tent just before 6. It was quite obvious at this point, as it had been for a while really, that we were going no further that night. Better a safe and hungry night than the alternative of traversing Schjelderup Lake in the dark.

So we pooled what we had. One cup-a-soup, one bar of chocolate, one quarter bagel saved from lunch, a bit of salami, 3 dried bananas and some energy bars. The recipe: make up cup-a-soup with 2 cups of water, divide into 2. Add one eighth of a bagel, some chopped salami, stir well and enjoy. Pretend that it’s a) good (actually it was) and b) enough. Let your partner eat his chocolate first, and then offer to exchange your half for a half share in his house. Only narrowly fail to sell him on the concept. The bananas and bars we saved for breakfast. Just to compound the discomfort, the weather changed rapidly for the worse. From shirt sleeves on the summit at 1pm we were reduced to wearing every stitch we had by 7. We finished “dinner” just as the first rain squalls blew through and were in the tent well before 8. We were hungry but we were safe and who needs food when you can feast on success?

The view from the summit of the Golden Hinde. Roughly from the northeast to the west. Cloud obstructed the view to the north.

Saturday, August 25

We awoke at 5.45 on our 4th morning to heavy cloud and the makings of a wet west coast day. No point in lingering over breakfast since there wasn’t any to speak of. But we did take the time to make lots of hot drinks before packing up and heading down into the gathering storm. My altimeter has gained almost 100 metres during the night, so we knew we were in for a good soaking.
    
On the way down Graham decided that we were going to make a start on a higher route around Schjelderup and headed into the bush about 100 metres from the lake outflow and 50 metres above it. Naturally he chose the day it poured down to do this. After half an hour of thrashing about in or clinging for dear life to sopping wet slide alder, huckleberry and pack grabbing undergrowth – in other words, a typical Vancouver Island backcountry moment - we were forced, suitably chastened, down to the lake but at least south of the big bluff that had so irked us on the way in.

The rest of the traverse around the lake was as painful as it was 2 days before but at last it was over and we were headed over to Carter and food.

The rain stopped briefly while breakfast/lunch/dinner was cooking and I got the tent out to dry off a bit but it soon returned and we ate in a downpour.

Off again at 12.30 and this time no diversions were permitted as we slid down to the river crossing, across and began the slow plod back up to Phillips Ridge. The lack of food now began to tell as I found the final steep bit up the gully particularly trying. We arrived in the saddle at 2.30pm precisely.

All that was now left to do was see how far we could travel south along Phillips Ridge before we became too tired to go any further. The answer for me came at about 6pm when I simply had nothing left to give. The last bump had been a particular chore as we attempted to avoid going right over the top and ended up on a hairy, exposed traverse on loose, sharp limestone. We’d certainly reversed at least 3 sub-summits on the ridge but since we were in heavy cloud and couldn’t be bothered getting the GPS out, we weren’t sure how many more there were to go. I really didn’t care. I wanted my dinner and my sleeping bag very soon thereafter. We found a spot with good water but not too flat. It would have to do. We were in the tent and finally getting warm by 8pm as ever thicker clag rolled in.

Sunday, August 26

A restless night as we slid repeatedly down to the bottom of the tent on our sloping site. It rained most of the night but we got up at 6 to a few signs of clearing and the cheering observation that there was ice on everything we’d left outside the tent or in the vestibule. If it’s that cold the pressure’s sure to be rising.
 
The best news of all, however, once the cloud thinned sufficiently, was that just a few hundred metres travel away was the bump where we’d eaten lunch 4 days before and where Phillips Ridge begins to turn east. And, yes, just across the way was our old friend 1732. We’d come a lot further along the ridge than I thought yesterday afternoon. Today was going to be a doddle.

And so it proved. Food had finally found its way into all the right gaps and I felt strong again. We were away by 8.15 and reached the base of 1732 an hour later. This time we found the correct path that contours the high point to the south. The crampons came out for the only time on the trip as we were faced with some early morning northwest facing snow. At about this point we began to run into people for the first time in 5 days. Naturally, everyone wanted beta and we were delighted to give it. We could probably have walked out from 1732 in 4 or 5 hours. Instead we spent nearly 7 hours on the process; chat a bit, walk a bit and repeat. You get the picture. With the weather improving by the minute I think that keeping the trip alive as long as possible was also uppermost in our minds.

However, all good things must end and we finally committed to the switchbacks down from Arnica Lake and arrived at the car at 4.10pm. My altimeter read 380 metres, almost exactly what it had 5 days before. Perhaps we had imagined all that bad weather?

Two hours later and it was end-of-trip-celebratory-meal-time. My choice this trip and it was DQ burgers and ice cream. Without any doubt the finest meal I’ve ever had in my entire life – until the next time we hit the hills of course.

Epilogue

After we got back from the trip and the dust had settled a bit, I sat down with a map and, by counting contours, estimated how much we'd actually climbed to accomplish a net elevation gain of 1,845 metres - the difference between our starting altitude at Westmin and the summit of the Hinde. I made it about 3,400 metres. In other words, you really do almost climb the mountain twice by this route. Taking the option to the head of Phillips Ridge to "Mt Judy" and dropping to the outflow of Schjelderup Lake from there results in a gross gain of over 4,000 metres. Take all this into account when you're making your plans to approach and climb the Hinde

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