[Philmont]: FW: [High_Adventure] Crew 729's Impeesa Extreme experience

Sorry for the off topic post and blatant own horn tooting by me, but I
wanted to make sure that everybody here who helped me put this together saw
this here as well.

Mike

------ Forwarded Message
From: "SSimpson@nyc.rr.com" <SSimpson@nyc.rr.com>
Reply-To: High_Adventure@yahoogroups.com
Date: Wed, 3 Sep 2003 10:07:40 -0400
To: High_Adventure@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [High_Adventure] Crew 729's Impeesa Extreme experience

September 3, 2003

Just wanted to give a report on our trek to Impeesa Extreme. Although we
were gone a total of two weeks, the trek itself had to be cut short to 7
days, given that we had to fly into Seattle. That meant that our total
traveling time just to get to camp was three days coming and going. I will
forgo descriptions of the travel to camp and just describe our trek.

Camp Impeesa is located in the southwest corner of Alberta, very near
Waterton-Glacier National Park. We never saw it. The entire west is
fighting forest fires this summer, we drove past many, and the trek site
was moved up to the Kananaskis area on a parallel with Calgary. About a
day before we left for Seattle, that area too became subject to fires, so
our operation was moved even farther north. If you go due west from
Edmonton toward the Rockies, you will see a town called Nordegg. The road
continues south a little ways to Abraham Lake. About midway down Abraham
Lake on the western side is a tributary called the Cline River. That was
our trailhead.

Our trek guide was Jeff Kittmer, the Fearless half of the Fearless Leader
and Awesome Leader Dynamic Duo who led our 2001 trek to Atikokan. It was
great spending time with Fearless again. Because this was all new
territory, hundreds of miles north of the Impeesa base, Fearless was
unfamiliar with the area, but remained his usual undaunted self. We had to
rely on a guidebook which described the Pinto Lake trail that followed the
length of the Cline River from Lake Abraham to Pinto Lake, a glacier-fed
lake abutting the snow-capped mountains at the eastern edge of the
Banff-Jasper National Parks border. We were then to cross over the saddle
connecting Minster Mountain to Cline Mountain and enter into the valley on
the other side formed by Waterfall Creek. From there, the guidebook
assured us we could pick up a trail taking us back down to the Pinto Lake
Trail, allowing us to circumperambulate the Minster Mountain massive.

Suffice it to say that there really isn’t a trail down the length of the
valley. We had to bushwhack our way down almost the total length of the
valley climbing over rock fields and pushing through thick copses of
shoulder-high evergreens. We picked up game trails where we could. The
second go-around, I am quite confident that Fearless can make the trek much
smoother, though the scouts thought the bushwhacking was one of the high
lights of the trek. Our crew should be entitled to a pathfinding
commission for subsequent treks.

The entire trek was roughly 65 kms and was accomplished in 5 days. The
sixth day we rode horses at the Timberline program area deep in the Alberta
wilderness. This too was the real deal, no nose to tail of the horse in
front of you walking around the corral. We negotiated serious hills and
valleys and stream crossings and saw some terrific countryside. Many of
the scouts felt it was a highlight of the trek. There was a significant
contribution to scouting made by the Canadians whom B-P met during the Boer
War. It was neat to learn how those elements survive in today’s scout
uniform.

“Philmont is nothing compared to this.”
-- Jahzeel Montes, Philmont July 2003, Impeesa Extreme August 2003.

For me, the highlight was crossing over the saddle into the valley beyond.
>From atop the saddle, high above the tree line, we could look down on herds
of grazing big horn sheep and look out to snow capped peaks that surrounded
us on all sides. If Pinto Lake and the valley beyond were in the lower 48,
they would be a crown jewel in the National Park System and visited by
millions ever year. Up here at the back door to Banff, no one pays them
any mind. The view was beyond spectacular; so much so that by the time we
arrived for a day at Glacier National Park in Montana, we were pretty much
jaded and not too impressed with the Many Glaciers Campground. What we saw
on the trek completely blew it away. The mountains were so high and so
huge that I couldn’t use the panoramic setting on my camera, since I
couldn’t take a picture of the lakes, rivers at the bottom of the frame
without cutting off the tops of the mountains. That is how huge, tall, and
close up the mountains were. The only people we saw during the trek were
two who were choppered in. The only signs we saw of civilization were the
helicopters flying over that were chartering sightseeing rides for people
to see the ice fields where we were camping. Understand the significance
of this. Where we had pitched our tents, other people had come from all
over the world to charter helicopters to take them to see. We were camping
in a National Geographic special.

Major credit goes to Mike Bingley for pulling this off. Though I have yet
to see Impeesa, both Fearless and I feel strongly that the Pinto Lake trail
needs to be kept open as an optional satellite base for the program. Our
crew consisted of me and my wife, Kathy, and five boys and five girls. The
youngest was 13. All had a tremendous time, they all took care of
themselves, they were all overwhelmed by the landscape. I probably had the
hardest time dragging myself over the saddle and would do it again in an
instant.

Bingley is a true visionary, and as more young turks move into executive
positions at Scouts Canada, they will have the opportunity to seize the
potential for high adventure treks that Canada has to offer. Bingley
outlined four other program areas he has in mind from Newfoundland to
Vancouver that could service the 35,000 scouts that are turned away from
Philmont every year. At Impeesa there is a cave formation called Gargantua
that can take three days to explore. One of the options they are
investigating calls for a three-day campout inside the cave, including a
50-foot rappel. I am convinced that with a million dollars in
capitalization and ten years, Scouts Canada can own high adventure in North
America. We will all be the better for it.

In closing, it is not my intention to put Philmont down. I just want to
point out the tragic reality that for so many troops across this country,
Philmont is an all-or-nothing proposition. Troops either get into Philmont
or they do nothing and try again next year. Many troops refuse to consider
viable alternatives to Philmont. That is most unfortunate. For my money,
Impeesa Exteme is just like Philmont except a. you won’t come out of the
experience feeling like processed sausage #C-2479, b. you won’t see anybody
else on the trail, c. the mountains are ten times higher and green and d.
every campsite is either by a glacier-fed lake, waterfall or river.

I don’t believe I can attach photos in this newsgroup. However anybody who
wished to contact me off-line, I see if I can send some. And I’m serious
about the million dollars. Any venture capitalists reading this should
contact Bing directly.

Scott Simpson
Advisor
Crew 729
New York City

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Received on Wed Sep 3 14:20:20 2003