Donjek - Day 3

Hoge Pass and Hoge Creek

August 4, 2015

My day started at 03:00 as I did the last watch. All was quiet except for a couple of caribou that walked through the camp in the early morning light. We were on the trail by 08:00 and ascending gently along the river to the warden's cabin at the park boundary. There were lots of animal relics on display here; antlers, horns, skulls, and the like. Next we started some serious climbing up to the top of Hoge Pass. This took several hours, especially as the phenomenal vistas had us stopping frequently to take pictures. Several flocks of dall sheep were observed climbing the impossibly steep talus slopes, as they reciprocally observed our motley party climbing on the moderate terrain between the peaks. At the summit of the pass we took a long lunch break. Marc, Glenn and I climbed higher to a local summit and were rewarded with a fantastic view down into a cirque. We descended down the ridge to rejoin the others and then made a very steep sustained descent down a gully of rolling stones. This took some time until we finally reached Hoge Creek. The next few kilometers took some time as we had to follow this twisting raging torrent through some narrow canyons which required us to switch sides many times. Each crossing was difficult, with some being rock hopped, some were forded in water shoes, and some we even set up a rope belay. We came across a wider section with still about three kilometers to go until the Donjek valley. As we were all tired at this point, and since area proved to provide a good place to camp, we decided to stay. It looks like we are high enough that bears should not be a problem. The heat however from the arctic sun is somewhat stifling as the UV rays beat down at us at 19:00. There are still a few hours until the shadow of the ridge will cool our camp, but I am so tired I am going to try sleeping in the tent-oven soon anyway.

Good morning Kluane!