Today, Kerri and I completed the 16km Twin Falls loop trail just over the B.C. border in Yoho National Park. The walk starts from the Takkakaw Falls car park and heads deep into Yoho Valley (above). (We came to Takkakaw Falls in July last year.)
The trail meandered through the forest initially before climbing up to get a view of the opposite side of the valley. Through a gap in the trees we saw Angel's Staircase (above).
Laughing Falls
Along the trail to Twin Falls, there are a number of other waterfalls worth having a look at. The most notable is Laughing Falls (above & below). Maybe it isn't the world's most spectacular waterfall, but it's certainly worth a rest stop en-route to Twin Falls.
Twin Falls
Here's the reason we walked 8 kms along a fairly steep trail at times. Twin Falls was definitely worth the walk. <Edit: Even 2 days later, our legs still hurt.> It was quite the nice scene to sit for a 1/2 hour and have lunch.
Twin Falls is quite remote and not accessible by any vehicle bigger than an ATV. Despite that, there's a fairly significant steel bridge that crosses the steam at the foot of the falls. On the other side of the bridge is the return part of the loop trail.
After a pleasant lunch at Twin Falls, we started out long trek back to the car. Instead of retracing our footsteps we continued along the loop past Marpole Lake (below). Just after we set off toward the lake, we crossed the path of this pretty little unnamed small creek cascading down the hillside.
Marpole Lake
We descended through the forest a little way down to Marpole Lake. Unfortunately it started raining just as we reached the lake so taking photos just wasn't on. As we climbed up along a scree slope, I was able to snap a shot or two back towards the lake.
Hoary Marmots
The scree slope seemed to go on for ever. The trail wasn't marked very well and it was quite a tricky climb. Near the top of the slope, we spotted a couple of hoary marmots sunning themselves on the roof of their house after the rain.
As we crept closer to the marmots (they were living on the side of the trail after all) we realized there were in fact 3 of them. I guess it isn't that surprising because they're the largest cousin of the ground squirrels that live in large families.
We managed to get right up close to these fury little animals (actually they're not that little). They are the same species as the one that we saw up in Alaska. The Alaskan version was a blue grey, whereas these were more brown.
Eventually the trail stopped climbing and we descended back into the valley. Just as the loop trail comes back together, there is a couple of small lakes. They especially interesting. Above is Lake Duchesney.
As we broke out of the forest and across an avalanche chute half a kilometre from the car park, we could get a good look at Takakkaw Falls cascading nearly 180m off the escarpment in front of us.
It had been a tough, yet rewarding day despite the cloud and occasional shower. There are many interesting hikes like this one in the Rockies waiting for us to conquer.
