SHR Aug 017

[Mike Bozman]

Oh wait.  You probably thought I meant the Sierra High Route.  Nope.  I mean the other SHR: Strathcona Haute Route.  Strathcona Provincial Park is BC’s oldest Provincial Park located in the center of Vancouver Island.  Outside of a few day use areas the park sees very little use in the back country.  The bushwhacking is legendary.  Here is a brief description of the B scale for bushwhacking.  Think Yosemite Decimal System but for bushwhacking.

A few quick stats about the hike:

Estimated Length ~200km

Almost entirely off trail

14 days planned duration.

Food resupply hidden near a trail head near the mid point.

Eastern side of hike is a big battle between flora and fauna

Western side of hike is almost completely above the treeline and crosses several glaciers and icefields.

Base weight about 14lbs inc iceaxe and crampons

About 12lbs of food for first 7 days (I am 6’2″, 200lbs, phyically fit/active so I eat a lot!)

When I first bought a copy of Hiking Trails III in 1993 (at the age of 12) I began dreaming of hiking from one side of Strathcona Park all the way to the other.  Over the years I have visited most parts of Strathcona Park at most times of the year.  About 9 years ago I set out to hike this trip with 2 other guys.  One would join us for the first week.  Myself and the other guys would continue on.  But it was not to be.  It was a heavy snow year and even though it was August everything above 1000m (3300 feet) was still under 3 feet of snow.  We aborted at the end of the first week.  It took us a week to travel about 60km.

Anyways, below is the account of the trip!

[Mike Bozman]

Day 0

So I had everything packed up in my pack and a plastic bucket for my resupply.  I left home around 8:30am, saying good bye to my wife and 6 year old son.  The drive up to Jim Mitchell Lake Rd. took about 5 hours including stops.  Total distance was about 350km.  I drove to the Bedwell Lake trail head and started to look around for a place to stash my food.  A few hundred meters up the road from the trail head there was a downed tree hanging over a cliff on the downhill side of the road.  Perfect location for a my cache.

I drove back to Campbell River to stay with my parents-in-law for the evening.  I made my father-in-law a deal: I’d buy the Tim Horton’s if he dropped me off at the Elk River Valley trail head by 8am the next morning.

We watched Game of Thrones and went to bed.

[Mike Bozman]

Day 1

Up at 6am and we hit the road at 6:30.  There was a lot of smoke on the horizon.  A few km down the road and we happened upon a house that was fully engulfed in flames.  The fire department was already there.  Later I found out that one person had escaped the fire and the other one had died.  My father (my family is from Campbell River as well) knew the woman who died as he had taught her daughter in elementary school.

Rather sober we stopped by Timmy’s for some coffee and breakfast.  The drive out to the Elk River Valley (near Gold River) takes about an hour.  The weather is nice with a few clouds.  The truck says it is about 11C.  By the time I get ready at the trail head it is nearly 8am on the dot.  I bid my father-in-law farewell and head off.  The guide book says it takes about 6 hours to reach the upper gravel bar campsite on the Elk River Trail.  It never takes me anywhere close to that.  This time was no different.  The 10ish km take 2.25 hours in the cool morning.  There was no one camped in the Elk River Valley; which surprised me a bit but I was starting out on a Monday morning.  From here on in it would be bushwhacking and the occasional faint bit of trail where terrain pushes 2 and 4 legged animals into very specific routes.

3 hrs gets me to the spot where the river disappears.  It is odd but there is so much avalanche debris that the river is simply missing for a few hundred meters; it percolates through the rock.

Bashing my way through the large slide paths coming off of Mt Colwell was a challenge.  Solid B4 in several places.  The route is probably used more by elk and bears than people.  Plenty of bear scat on the trail but nothing too fresh.

5hrs gets me to Elk Pass at about 1400m elevation.  The last 1hr was above the treeline and pretty pleasant.  Elk Pass is where the real hiking starts!  The descent down the south side of the pass is wickedly steep and, since it faces south, bushy at this elevation.  The route drops about 400 meters of elevation in about 400 meters as the crow flies.  The route finding is not too difficult: Go straight down.  When you cliff out, go left until you can go straight down again.  It takes about 45 minutes to descend to a nice small meadow at the base of the pass.  A quick hike across the meadow net me the west shore of a small narrow lake and some easy hiking.  Clearly a bear trail.  Again there is a very abrupt bushwhack descent down to a very round lake.  Descent is about 200 meters in 300 meters with a bunch of B3 bush and a little scrambling directly down the mostly dry creek bed.

Once at the shore of the round lake there is another nasty B3/B4 bushwhack around the west shore of the round lake.  There is only a small area, between some large cliffs and the lake, that one can travel.  Again, it is a bit of a bear highway judging by the scat and tracks.  Luckily I did not see anything!  The 500 meters or so took close to an hour to complete.

Out of the bush there is some decent camping on a flat-ish area 50 feet up from the lake.  I set up my SMD Lunar Solo on the only half ok area that will take a few pegs.  Total hiking time was about 8 hrs and I think I covered nearly 20km.  A pretty solid first day.  To put this in perspective, back in 2008 it took us 2.5 days to reach this same location.  I had planned on daily mileage dropping significantly after the first day.

After setting up my camp I happened to look south towards a small tarn a few hundred feet away.  It seemed like there was a strange reflection or something in the pond so I walked over towards it.  There was silt all stirred up in the water.  Odd.  I walked around the tarn.  It was maybe 120 feet by 50 feet.  On the far side I noticed a singular ultra fresh bear track in the mud on the edge of the pond.  It had clearly sauntered down the slope, through the pond and skirted around my camp and down towards the lake (or the bear trail around the lake!).  It didn’t bother me too much and that was the last I saw of the bear that night.

Dinner was a package of freeze dried food.  My only one of the trip.  I decided to ‘treat’ myself.  Seemed tasty enough.  About 2 hrs later I was wearing all my warm clothes shivering in my sleeping bag.  I suspected food poisoning.  Was up a bunch through out the night.  Lots of fluid and 4 doses of imodium seemed to calm it down a bit.

 

[Mike Bozman]

Title was supposed to read SHR Aug 2017.  Some how I missed the 2?  And I can’t edit…

[Mike Bozman]

Day 2

I awoke feeling rough and toyed with the idea of hiking back out.  The thought of the bushwhacking and ascending the descents did not really appeal to me.  The weather was very nice; almost cloud free.  I was up around 630am.  The sun did not poke over the mountains until 8am.  There was a lot of condensation everywhere.

After some breakfast and a lot to drink I thought I felt ok to keep hiking.  I was all packed and ready to go by 830am.  I lingered a bit waiting for the sun to poke out to dry my tent and sleeping bag a bit.

The day’s hike started going steeply up to gain a ridge that would lead me towards Mt DeVoe.  Elevation gain was about 560 meters in less than 2 km.  The terrain was not hard but just a bit slow going due to my previous night and the micro route finding challenges through the numerous bluffs and small cliffs.

The descent down to the Mt Devoe col was pretty straight forward without any real bush but steep.  This was steep snow back in 2008 and one of my group had a slip and slid a short way down the slope before stopping.  It was a bit of a ‘brown’ moment.  I stopped in the col to get more water.  It took about 2 hours to get a bit more than 2km.  I was still feeling dehydrated so I drank a bunch of water and filled up.  The weather was pleasant, being neither too warm in the sun nor too cold in the shade, with a light breeze.

Descending from DeVoe col included more bushwhacking and cliff avoidance.  Much like Elk Pass the general route of travel (no trail) is down and head left when you can’t go down any more.  Mostly B3 and some pleasant slightly more open B2 areas.

No sooner than I got to the bottom of the descent did the route head right back up again.  Elevation gain was nearly 400 meters in about 1km followed by some ‘rolling’ terrain for about 2 km.  The rolling terrain looks pretty good on the topo maps but it fails to show all the small cliffs where you drop down 50 meters, walk 30 seconds of ok terrain and then gain it all back again.  It took a few hours to ascend the ridge system and follow it towards the descent at the SE corner.

I was still having problems with my stomach and my hydration.  My stomach was unsettled and I had little appetite.  I thought I was drinking lots but my urine was still very dark and the volume was low.

The descent from the ridge to the low point below The Behinde (No BS real name.  It is a sub-summit behind the Golden Hinde) is very steep dropping about 400 meters in 800 meters.  It is vastly different from the other nasty descents!  On this descent when you cliff out, you go right!!!  Going left gets you in to a whole world of hurt and too many cliffs.  A few times I did not go right far enough and had to ascend a short distance to get around the cliffs.  The upper section of the descent is pretty open and not too bushy.  Lower down, nearing the Wolf/Burman divide it becomes bushier.  I was feeling pretty rough by the time I got to the pass and running low on water.  There was nothing to be had at the pass so I continued the bushwhack towards the large slide that came off of The Behinde.  There is a route that continues up this slide and eventually puts you at a small lake.  Typically this is where people camp before they climb Golden Hinde.  The Hinde is Vancouver Islands highest peak at 2195m/7201ft, 46th most isolated summit in Canada, 65th most prominent peak in North America.  My original plan had me going up this route and climbing the Hinde.  I was just not feeling it though.  Instead I decided that it would be wiser to contour out of the Wolf/Burman divide towards Burman Lake.  This would be 4-5km of bushwhacking without a huge amount of elevation.  There are plenty of small streams coming off of The Behinde that are not shown on the map.  I was able to top up with water a short while after getting out of the pass.  I was still feeling terrible and dehydrated.  I continued to drink as much water as I could but it was not helping.

The bush-bash contouring was slow going.  Several times I needed to pull out the GPS to make sure that I was heading in the general direction at the right elevation.  I was looking forward to get to Burman Lake where there was some decent camping and good water.  If need be, I could have a rest day and still be in a perfectly fine position to make it to my resupply before I ran out of food.

Things started to go down hill during this section of the hike.  My speed dropped to sub 1km/hr due to terrain and sapped energy levels.  Some of the creek crossings where very difficult because of the narrow steep gullies that they where in.  There was very little water in the creeks.  Enough to drink but not much more than that.  I could feel myself tiring and becoming a bit more clumsy.  In the last km my legs started cramping.  Mostly my left hamstring.  Dehydration was catching up to me even though I was still drinking.  I was so close I could taste the camping at Burman Lake.

I made it to the lake very spent and quite sore from the cramping.  First thing was to get a bunch of liquid in me.  I consumed close to 2L with some Nuun tabs and tried to eat a Snickers bar.  The muscle cramping was getting worse if I wasn’t super careful about what I was doing.  I did manage to set up mt Lunar Solo and toss my gear in the tent.  I don’t know how long it took but it was slow.  I had to head to the bushes to defecate urgently.  It was unpleasant as I really had to go but I was cramping badly; especially my abs and neck.  I managed not to get any on me and get reasonably cleaned up.  Almost back at my camp I started to feel hypotensive.  I got down on the ground but still blacked out a bit.  How long I down know but I would guess only a seconds?  At that point it was after 7pm and dusk was coming quickly.  My condition was worsening.  I decided to hit SOS on the SPOT.  I was still feeling very hypotensive and very cold.  I had already changed out of my hiking clothes and put on dry stuff.  I added more layers; fleece sweather and down jacket.  It was probably 18C out so it was not cold and I was dry.  It took me a bit to get my ID (driver’s license and credit card) into my pocket.  I put my headlamp on my head and tossed my Ursack as far as I could.  It probably didn’t even make it 50 feet but at least it was in the door of my shelter.  I was able to crawl into my shelter and find a way to lie that was comfortable enough that I was not cramping up.  I was expecting to wait until morning.  I do not know how long I lay in my shelter contemplating mortality and feeling extremely faint.  It was completely dark with no moon when I heard a helicopter.  I managed to sort of slug crawl(?) out of my shelter.  Standing up or even crawling on all 4’s felt like it would cause me to lose consciousness.  I was shivering pretty bad laying on the ground flashing my headlamp at them.  The Petzl e+lite is pretty weak.  It took them 10 minutes to find me.  Later it turns out that my wife had been patched through to the pilot of the helicopter and relayed to him the last ping from my SPOT.  Once they found me they hovered near by while 2 guys came down the hoist.  The prop wash off of the lake was spraying my quite badly.  It was like being in a 100 mph car wash.

Turns out it was the Air Force from CFB Comox since they have mountain night flight/rescue capability but at the time I could not have told you anything about it other than it was a helicopter and one of the two guys on the ground had a French Canadian accent.

They set up an IV, took my blood pressure (70/40), temp (don’t know what was but they said I was hypothermic) and heart rate (it felt irregular).  I was wet from the prop wash and shivering badly.  I didn’t feeling very cold though.  My limbs where becoming very stiff and they didn’t work right.  At one point I was asked if I had any ID.  I tried a few times to get it from my pocket but my hand and arm simply would not work as I thought the should.

They strapped me into some sort of stretcher thing and hoisted me up.  I don’t know how long they were on the ground.  I did hear one of the guys mention that they had only 1 hr on the ground.

The flight back to CFB Comox was surprisingly smooth.  I don’t know how long the flight took either.  Under different circumstances (good health, day light) the helicopter ride would probably have been quite scenic.

My blood pressure was higher with the IV fluids.  Once we landed, they unstrapped my from stretcher thing.  The change from laying down to a bit more upright to facilitate getting onto the ambulance’s stretcher caused me to almost pass out again.  Good thing they were quick.  The ride to the ER in Comox was fairly quick.  The paramedic in the back of the ambulance with me seemed nice.  He was asking me some super basic questions and I could understand him but I was unable to get complete responses out of my mouth.  I thought I could, or should be able to answer but couldn’t.  The only way I can describe this likening it to know an actors face and his name is on the tip of your tongue.  You know you know it but you can quite get it out.  Very odd because I was aware that my brain was just not working right but I probably could not had described it at the time.  Maybe they gave me some drugs?  I don’t know and don’t remember.

I was at the hospital around midnight.  4L of IV fluid. 2L saline, 2 potassium.  Usual vitals, blood work, urine sample, fecal sample if I could(I couldn’t).  The potassium painful while it was going in and they had to turn down the volume a couple of times.

 

[Mike Bozman]

Day 3

I was discharged about 9am.  I felt like I had been run over by a truck from all the cramping.  My father-in-law picked me up.  I had eaten almost nothing in the last 24 hrs.  He treated me to some Timmy’s coffee and a bagel.  I felt a lot better after eating.  I was not given any food or liquid in the hospital.  It was just all IV fluids!

Emotionally, the whole situation didn’t really hit me until the ride home from the hospital.  One might think that the rescue comes and everything gets better because you are going to be saved.  I think that it actually got worse, mentally.  My wife experienced the same thing after she was told that they found me.  The psychological side of it something I can talk about in a later post.

I spend most of the remainder for the taking it easy in Campbell River and sleeping.  Eating and drinking were returning to normal and muscular pain seemed appropriate for what I had been through.

It was tough to sleep that night as the whole situation was haunting me a little.  Actually a lot.  Eventually I did manage to drift off and I was looking forward to driving back to Victoria the next morning.  My wife wanted me to meet her for lunch if I was home in time.

[Mike Bozman]

Day 4

I woke up feeling pretty sore.  Too be expected I thought.  My left leg was really sore though.  It was the only part of me that was more sore than the previous day.  I had some breakfast, took some naproxen and decided to try driving home.  My left leg was a bit swollen and driving did not make it feel any better.  I turned around and went back to my parents-in-law’s house.  This was around 830am.  I took it easy for the next three hours but continued to feel worse.  I was starting to feel very hypotensive again and my left leg was swelling noticably.  My mother-in-law drove me to the ER as we suspected I had a DVT.  The ER was crazy busy since it was lunch time on a Thursday but they saw me very quickly probably because they too thought I had a DVT.  In the ER I saw the same paramedic from the ambulance ride Tuesday night.  The usual IV, vitals, blood work, etc, and and EKG.  EKG showed no DVT.  Thank god.  Blood work showed CK reading through the roof.  ER doc diagnoses rhabdomyolysis but he feels that with some IV fluids and continuing to drink a lot of fluids I should be fine to go home in a bit.  Eventually went back to parents-in-law’s house.  Rested the rest of the day and had another rough night.

 

[Mike Bozman]

Day 5+

Eventually I made it back to my own house.  Its been a rough several days!  My rescue made the local paper in Campbell River.  At least I didn’t make the obituaries.  I had a lot of good pictures of the hike but, my camera, like all my other hiking gear, it is currently enjoying an extended solo camping trip at Burman Lake without me.  There is no way I will be able to get in there this year to retrieve my gear.  Unfortunately I have lost all of my gear that I have been accumulating over the years.  This was even the maiden voyage for my new Granite Gear Virga 2!

(In case you were curious it handled the 30ish pound (inc water) load with ease.  I used a full size Z-lite as a frame.  Only problem with the pack was the load lifters.  They would work them selves loose over time but they didn’t really do too much.)

The only gear that made it out of there with me was the clothes on my back, a 100wt EB FA fleece sweater,  Westcombe down jacket, my ID, SPOT and bear bell.  The bear bell was attached to the SPOT.  But things are things and can be replaced.

I am sure that some bear has had a good snack from my Ursack.

 

[Mike Bozman]

Epilogue

Please excuse any typos, grammer, etc.  Typing this out is a bit like reliving it and it has been somewhat therapeutic.  Time will tell if I will get out on any big solo trip in the future.  This was hard on my wife.  Luckily my son is only six and does not grasp the whole situation.  He knows what happened and thinks it is pretty cool that I got to go for a ride in an air force helicopter.

Next spring, if you see me skulking around in the Gear Swap section posting WTB threads, please remember this trip report and cut me a good deal!

[Mike Bozman]

Newspaper article

 

[Ken Thompson]

Glad you are OK.

[Ben C]

Sounds horrible.  No more complaining by me about any of my trips.  ANy idea what caused things to go downhill?

[Mike Bozman]

The food poisoning was the catalyst of it all.  I could not get on top of my hydration no matter how much I drank.

[Author]

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