Under a clear blue sky and +1 Celsius, 13 members of the Edmonton Swiss Society followed Joe Stadler and Bruno Dobler's lead to tackle 2'885 m high Mount Wilcox.

We arrived on Friday night at the Wilcox campground to be there early Saturday morning August 13th. We left the campground around 8.30 am and reached the pass in about 2 hrs. It was a beautiful ascent through alpine meadows and pine trees.  After a short rest and snack we started the rather steep hike up to the edge of vegetation. From there it was a "scramble" up to the top. Sometimes we didn't know whether to move left or right; the path wasn't very clear. But we made it nevertheless and the view over the mountains, the valley below and the ice fields was fantastic. Soon the Canadian flag and Swiss flag were flying in the wind and the accomplishment toasted.

The hiking poles came in quite handy on the way down. Since the upper portion of the mountain was all scree, it would have been easy to start sliding.

Tired but happy about having raised the bar for future hikes, we reached the campground without incidents and in good spirits.  Around the campfire that night we already started talking about possible mountains for next year's hike.

Joe and Bruno, thanks again for a wonderful day and all the memories that come with it.

Priska Strickler

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