Technical Canmore Quad
On July 8, Mike Burke and I completed a slightly more technical version of what is commonly referred to as the Canmore Quad. The idea for this variation was first put in my head about five years ago, after completing what was then the FKT for the standard Quad route in 7 hrs 48 min. This year, Karl Augsten shaved just over 30 minutes off that time, bringing it down to 7 hrs 13 min, which is of course extremely quick. A few days after my FKT effort back in 2020, Adam Campbell and Eric Carter connected the NE Buttress of Ha Ling, the North Ridge of EEOR, the West Ridge of Grotto, and the ESE Ridge of Lady Macdonald, making up a slightly more technical version of the trail-running quad, in 18.5 hours.
As is often the case with objectives in your backyard, they don’t get done very quickly because there’s no sense of urgency. Fortunately, this year we finally decided it was worth putting some effort into and made the time to complete the linkup. It wasn’t too much of a stretch to envision doing all the routes in one go, as we had been doing frequent “training runs” on many of them in the months and years leading up to this. In total, we used two vehicles as gear drops, with one parked at the Gap and another at Cougar Creek, and otherwise received no outside support—except for my kind partner Sara bringing us (or maybe just me) a Coke on the final stretch down Lady Mac.
Mike on the NE Buttress with Lady MacDonald and Grotto in the background. This picture was from a previous outing on the route.
Northeast Buttress of Ha Ling
We started the day at 5:57 a.m. from my place right in the middle of town. A quick run up the Gap brought us to the base of the classic NE Buttress, where we were pleased to find no other parties. We simul-soloed this route and found ourselves on the summit of Ha Ling well before 8:00 a.m. The jog back down the trail was very enjoyable in the nice, cool morning air.
On the summit of EEOR
North Ridge of EEOR
Next was a quick stop at the car we had stashed the evening prior, where we collected a 30 m rope, rack, rock shoes, etc., before making our way over to the North Ridge. We simul-climbed this route in two pitches to the top of the difficulties, where we shoved the kit back into our bags before pushing on to the summit. We topped out on EEOR at about 10:30 a.m., still in good spirits and pleased to be done with the two routes we were most concerned about in terms of running into other parties.
Summit selfie on Grotto
West Ridge of Grotto
Running down the dusty Gap road, back through town to the north side of the valley, brought us to car number two at the Cougar Creek parking, where we refuelled for the remaining two peaks, starting with the West Ridge of Grotto. Admittedly, I had never done this route in its entirety, and I was grateful that Mike had spent some time on it prior. It was a bit of a slog up Grotto (as it always is!), especially with the heat of the day setting in. I chased after Mike along the ridge to the summit and then back down, as we descended via the more common hiking route on the peak. As we hit the creek bed again, I enjoyed the glorious cold water to get a little reprieve from the dry heat.
Mike scrambling up one of the lower cruxes on the ESE Ridge
East-Southeast Ridge of Lady Macdonald
Gaining the ESE Ridge is (like Grotto) a bit of a slog up a dusty, dry trail. The nice part about finishing with this route was that we both knew it intimately well. I made the mistake of not bringing any plain water, which was challenging, as I simply couldn’t stomach the high-carb drink I was carrying any longer. This meant no water, which was a bit tough, but as we gained the upper ridge a cool breeze did wonders to take the edge off the heat. The run back down the trail to town wasn’t feeling quite as good as the run down Ha Ling had felt earlier in the day!
Final summit of the day on Lady Mac
After getting held up by a train and having a bit of a forced break, we were back where we started 11 hrs 55 min later, having covered a little over 50 km and 5,000 m.
