Hermit Meadows

We were at Hermit Meadows over the long weekend with Mark, a former colleague of mine. We didn't really have any specific objectives in mind and just wanted to spend a couple of nights out and perhaps get up onto the glacier below Mount Rogers.

Brenda and I made the same trip last year and have fond memories of being forced to dig out a tent platform with a pot from our cook set. With the big snow pack this year we made sure to bring a shovel this time. In the end we could have used two or three. There was still 2-3 meters of snow in places. It took hours of digging but it was well worth it to have a nice dry (albeit cramped) platform to pitch the tents on.



We had a good dinner, drank lots of tea, and watched the sun set on the mountains across the valley, but we were soon chased into our tents by the cold wind.

We woke to a nice morning with a mix of sun and cloud and made our way over Tupper Ridge and onto the glacier.



Just for kicks we climbed a steep snow slope to reach the top of a sub-peak beside Mount Rogers. It's the double humped feature in the center left of this photo:


Here's Mark trying to decide whether or not he's having fun (he was):


Another night out and then back down to the car where we found one of Brenda's most favourite things in the world...a cool bug!


Leave a comment if you can you help us identify him. I should have put something else in the photo for comparison because he looks tiny. Actually his body alone was about 2-3cms long.