lunch

A group of us hiked Healy Pass & Sunshine Meadows yesterday. Gorgeous hike! Most of us had hiked it before & chose to hike again since the wild flowers are out right now. They are not at full bloom yet though, damned late spring!! The flowers in Waterton, AB were further along. Perhaps since Waterton is further south?

It was a gorgeous day. Sun shining and warm. We hiked Healy Pass first, had lunch then crossed over the meadow to Sunshine (the ski hill) and hiked down the mountain there. I am not a skier so I can't tell you where we stopped for a drink after the 'hike' part. We ran out (not all of us ran it) the ski-out after our refreshment to the building at the parking lot. There's a creek there (Healy Creek) where we cooled our tootsies after a long day of being on them. All in all a glorious day in the mountains. This is not an exceptional tough hike, it's just long.

The clouds in this shot are great. And wow, look how green it is! I guess it's all the rain & late spring we had (i.e. snow from late 2010/early 2011).

I actually sketch after I ate lunch. It's rare I have time! I believe the sketch below was the first.

This is a lipstick brush flower (or that's what I've been told).
Didn't have time to colour it since it clouded over & cooled slightly.

Here's at the summit of Sunshine Meadows.

Yesterday saw deer (when in the car), a marmot or two & a gorgeous black wolf - which was totally missed by 4 of us as we hiked with our heads down then a friend yelled as us from behind to turn around to see it (thank you!).
But with all the warmth & humidity, you can't forget about the other lovely friends you meet in the wilderness; those being of course, the mosquitos.
I stopped to take the photo below and when I stopped for what seemed like less than one minute, I was swarmed. I literally wiped off my arms of mosquitos & I easily killed 5 or 6 per arm. My legs were not so lucky. Thankfully mosquito bites don't bug me. Rarely am I bit by mosquitos when in the city but when I am, they don't itch. The bites I got yesterday are no exception. They're there and not itchy. Yay!

This is where 3 of us 'cut' down one of the ski runs to cut off some distance.
Not sure why at this point. It wasn't faster & all it did
was stir up some friendly mosquitos looking for a snack.