Jumbo Valley Hut Trip

Jumbo Valley – September 9-11, 2016

My first introduction to the Jumbo Valley came about twenty years ago on my first visit to the Invermere, BC area. Like many people at that time, I wasn’t even aware of Jumbo, or the controversy surrounding it. But I kept noticing these bumper stickers on almost everyone’s vehicle in the little town! There seemed to be only two: Jumbo Wild, or, It Snows In Jumbo. Everyone had an opinion, and most seemed to come highly charged.

This was an intriguing thing back then, and it got me interested.  I followed along as a casual witness rather than an active participant in the controversy for many years.  I would say however, that it is places like this that inspire people to take a more active role in protecting what they love, rather than sitting on the sidelines watching.  The fact that this controversy continued to grow and came to a head in recent years would suggest that Jumbo was indeed a special place.  In 2015, my little family and I headed up there in late August to see it for ourselves. This day trip led us to commit to coming back on what would be our first ever hut trip this past September of 2016.  (Jumbo Wild, the film about the area and the controversy, was released shortly after our first 2015 trip up there making hut reservations extremely difficult to secure.   The film is available on Netflix. For hut information, the website is: http://www.cvhsinfo.org .)

Here’s our story:

Jumbo has long been a place of controversy. But it’s been a place of wild, untamed beauty far longer. And that is what we were after: the wildness, the raw energy of a place removed from everyone, and no way to connect to anything outside of one another and nature.

The weeks leading up to the trip saw our three kids, ages 14, 11 and 6, excitedly collecting their gear. New sleeping bags, compression sacks and wool socks overflowed from their bedrooms as they tried everything out, before attempting to pack all on their own and squeeze it all snugly into their child-sized backpacks.

The weather forecast looked less than ideal, the word was the grizzlies were moving up into the alpine and no matter how much we edited our supplies, the parents’ packs stayed considerably heavier than hoped. But we were ready! We were excited! We were gonna do this! And like any good story, it was at this point that we began feeling a bit of nervousness and uncertainty creep in about bringing along our very petite six year old. Maybe we were asking too much. After all, last time we carried her a little ways up, and all the way down.  It’s a pretty strenuous hike even when your legs are regular size.

But the thing is, you never really know what your children can accomplish. Usually, they surprise you. If anything, we probably hold them back. So we decided that this was the mindset we needed to run with! We wanted this experience, we had talked about this experience, and she was one of those kids that always defied the odds. She could do it. Sure, it’s straight up and she’s carrying her own pack, but she could do it. She kind of had to do it.  We couldn’t carry her if she got tired or if it was too much mountain, because we could barely carry our own packs (seriously, why were they still so heavy?). We put the thought that we were going to have any issue with this completely out of our minds. We locked the truck on the side of the muddy and washed out logging road, grabbed a selfie at the trailhead when everyone was looking fresh and happy, and turned up the trail, ignorantly imagining we could do this in three hours.

The hike was glorious! (And 4.5 hours) It was a cool fall day; the temperature that keeps you from overheating when carrying a ridiculous load up a mountain.  The sun shone, birds sang, and things were pretty spectacular.

As we approached the steep part about an hour and a half in we heard our first, “How much longer? I am too tired! Can I have a shoulder ride?” The answer was a breathless sort of “No.”  But we had candy. Five bags of bribes! And the rest was history. It was blissful actually, which I think we hoped for but certainly weren’t counting on.  If you hike with kids you know what I mean. You always prepare for the worst and hope for the best.   I’ve found letting the kids be the lead guide is the ticket (we even refer to them as Lead Guide;). And in truth, it’s an empowering opportunity and responsibility to give them.

You can see the hut about 45 minutes before you get to it. It is perched on a stunning little open meadow, bordered on either side by a valley and backed by a rocky ridge. A little tarn lies snugged in at the bottom of a little hill next to the hut. This is where hikers draw their drinking water from. Our son,the fourteen year old, volunteered to collect the five gallon pail of water.  Our outdoor adventure had provided yet another opportunity to be a responsible and contributing member of the group, one that our son took on without prompting.

The water collection proved to be a favourite activity and memory of this trip. After an afternoon spent exploring the rocky ridge, the valleys and the creek running down from the tarn, we discovered fresh grizzly tracks near the spot we were drawing water from. A moment like that is truly profound; a sacred experience. The kids filled water, leaving their tracks next to the grizzly’s. A spiritual sort of exchange took place. One that impressed itself deeply. Every one of our kids has commented on that moment since we’ve been home.

The rest of the trip saw us playing UNO by candle light, climbing boulders, sitting silently in awe, watching rain, fog, mist, light and shadows dance across this most spectacular of places. We explored with no plan, we ate when we were hungry, we slept when we were tired, and no one checked the time. We heard ourselves say things like, “Don’t get too hurt, because we can’t hike out until morning if you do,” and “Oh my gawd, we could not get help until the morning…..” (This was one of those things that we knew of course, but it FELT so different when we were watching our feral children running and jumping and swinging from things.)

We had friends join us for the final evening. Their packs were like elephants too.  Maybe we hadn’t done anything wrong after all with the packing.  It was, and is always, truly joyful for parents to watch a gaggle of kids and a dog run amok in the middle of the mountains!  Exploring absolutely everything they could find and never tiring of adventure.

Our final morning was dreamlike. It was ephemeral. It snowed in the night. The clouds hung low, yet near the mountain peaks, there was a gap, and sunlight poured down the face of the mountains all around us! It was like nothing anyone had seen. It was like nothing of this Earth! We could barely breathe, it was so exquisite.   We dared not even blink, in case it suddenly changed or disappeared. We could only stand there, looking on, knowing that this was something special. Something we may never witness again in our lives. Something we were so privileged to see, there must be a greater reason for it…

With our hearts full, we shrugged into our packs and half hiked, half slid down the snowy, slushy, slippery mountain trail, back to the truck  But we are not the same people that left it there three short days ago.

To put ourselves in places of wild and untouched beauty in the natural world should be mandatory. To learn safe and appropriate practices in these wild spaces should go without saying. Respect, responsible decision-making, risk assessment, and teamwork are all important skills that are continuously called on in these situations.

By bringing our families into nature, we create the opportunity for an exchange.  Nature shares herself so openly with us; her beauty, her danger, her vulnerability. And we are given the opportunity to fall in love so completely with her, reigniting a primal desire to protect her.

There is no greater example of this than the Jumbo Valley.