Thursday, August 11, 2022

Rocky Mountain Road Trip day 6

The itinerary for day 6 included one of my most anticipated attractions: the Peak to Peak Gondola. From Whistlers village, one ascends either the Whistler mountain or the Blackcomb mountain gondola. Between the two mountains is the 4.4km peak to peak gondola. We began with the Whistler Mountain gondola, mostly because ALL the summit hikes were still closed EXCEPT for the Pica's Traverse and Matthews Traverse up to the Whistler's summit. 
On the way up.
Medalists in all our hearts. 

The hike was along an access road, so the difficulty in navigating the terrain was minimal. The steepness of the trail, on the other hand, increased the difficulty level! The trail was maintained through the winter and meant there were snow walls still evident that became larger and larger as we approached the summit.
My elf children walking atop the snow.
The beginning of the long and winding road
More discussion about a) video games; b) youtube; or c) Taylor Swift?
A lovely Albertan man took this picture for us, even though we admitted to being from Toronto
Panorama from the first look out.
The snow walls kept getting higher and higher!
Snow wall selfie



One of multiple rock climbing pictures from this hike

The views also became more and more spectacular as we approached the summit. Honestly, I would stop and take a bunch of pictures thinking that was "the" best spot, only to have to stop another couple hundred metres up the trail for an even more majestic scene. One of the nearby peaks is called The Black Tusk, or the original Squamish name is Landing Place of the Thunderbird. However, to the Taylors (and multiple other people under the age of 30) it was Patrick. Patrick the starfish from Spongebob Squarepants. Patrick who was always looking at you no matter where along the trail atop Whistler mountain you were.
Our first glimpse of Patrick aka Black Tusk aka Landing Place of the Thunderbird
Close up

Once we had climbed the 3.3km to the summit of Whistler mountain, we had fun exploring the Cloudraker skybridge and Raven's Eye Cliffwalk. 


 Raven's Eye Cliffwalk as seen from the bridge
Titanic anyone?








The chairlift we took back down to near the gondola station
On the peak 2 peak gondola, we had a car all to ourselves the first time.
David WILL kill me if they know I've published this photo from their dance routine.

We checked out the Blackcomb peak, but unfortunately NONE of the trails were open. We saw a marmot again. We considered splurging on the dining room, but the menu options were not overly appealing and the prices were absolutely unappealing. We did come across many influencers taking their selfies, so when in Rome...
Our second (and last) marmot of the trip
Glamour shot David. Bonus: you can see the smoke rising from the only fire we encountered in our trip. The mountain ranger said he thought/hoped it was a controlled burn near Pemberton
Glamour shot Michael
Glamour shot Lucas
Glamour shot Chris
Glamour shot Marcy!

Since there were no more hikes to do, we did back to back peak to peak rides! On our ride back down to Whistler village we saw another black bear grazing at the side of a ski run meadow. So cool!

After all that hiking, we stopped for Dairy Queen on the way back to our apartment. This apartment building had a laundry room, we spent some time getting clean clothes and chilling in the hot tub. There was some music at the Olympic Park that Chris and I enjoyed while the kids zoned out in front of the tv. 

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