becoming a mountain climber in the canadian rockies | 🇨🇦 part ii

I'm so over the moon about this situation. I am currently in line in the queue to get into Jasper National Park. This isn't real! How is this real? I am now at that false summit. Um, I almost turned back. Sorry, it might be a little noisy because there's a train behind me, but welcome to Alberta, Canada! Oh my gosh! This isn't real! This isn't real! How is this real? Hello, Alberta! I hope I'm either the only person here or there's room to turn around if this boondocking spot is already taken. Oh my gosh. Ah! Oh, and there's nobody here! Oh, wow. How am I getting so lucky? How am I getting so lucky? Dude! How is this even free? How is this even... So originally, the plan was to head to Mount Robson Park today. I really wanted to do a trail called Berg Lake Trail, but upon further research, apparently there's a long-term closure that I was unaware of when I first picked it. So, I need to make up a new plan on the fly. So, this is called Yellowhead Highway. So, I'm just gonna keep going along here and make up a new plan as I go. Hi, good morning. Thank you so much. So easy. So easy. Get the Parks Pass. Get the Parks Pass. I don't know. For a whole year, just make sure you go a whole week. I don't know. And then it's worth it. I love you. Dude, Canada is so cool. Canada is so freaking cool. But seriously, what a beaut. I think that you just can't really go wrong if you follow your way towards rivers and mountains, you know? Okay, fresh Canadian spring water, check. So, you might be wondering why I chose Hinton, Alberta in Canada rather than, say, somewhere like Jasper in Jasper National Park. And my reply would be because... why not? No, Hinton has been a great stopover, if you will, to get all the van life essentials done, and it's beautiful out here. I've met some wonderful people. The thing about Jasper is, one, I've been there before, and two, it's a zoo. Like, it's just a zoo, literally and metaphorically. And it's a tourist town, and I'm not saying that it isn't Canadian. It's certainly a Canadian town, but it's a tourist town, and so you've got to pay to park everywhere. It's just a lot of gift shops and all that razzmajazz, and that's not what I'm going for. I want the countryside of Canada experience, and it's beautiful here in the fall. Holy sh... I don't know. Just the pops of yellow, the backdrop. I mean, gosh dang. Gosh dang, gosh dang. So I'm gearing up for my first solo summit. I guess you could call this my signature uncharted trail mix. It's got almonds, cashews, craisins, and raisins, dark chocolate-covered almonds, and pretzel pieces. I just mix it all together and store them in the plastic bags that the ingredients came in. A batch will usually last me a couple of weeks. All right, let's get this hike. Okay, today I am attempting to summit my first mini mountain in Canada. This is definitely going to be the hardest hike that I have ever tried, so... 1,600-something feet of elevation, so yeah, the first two miles have been hard. Very uphill, very much up. But this is the first waypoint. This is the first viewing spot. It's beautiful. It's gorgeous. This mountain hike is very humbling, very humbling. So if I'm not mistaken, this right here is another mountain that you can climb called Roche-à-Perdrie. Roche-à-Perdrie. Roche-à-Perdrie. It sounds very French. I'm probably butchering the name. Apologies to you French-speaking people. Someday, one day, I would love to tackle that. It's not going to be today, though. It's gorgeous to look at, though. So rumor has it that if you take a picture of yourself at the top of Folding Mountain and then you show it to the people working at the Folding Mountain Brewery at the bottom of the mountain, apparently they give you a free glass of beer. So I'm working towards that free beer. I sound so good right now. You know, I think what I love the most about this, about hiking on mountains and just mountain hiking in general, is that it has so much to teach you about humbling yourself and discipline. Discipline is really just choosing between what you want now and what you want most. And right now, what my body wants is for me to stop hiking this mountain and to turn around and go back down and just buy a glass of beer. Like, I don't need a free one. That's what my body wants right now. It just wants me to stop. But what I want most is to climb this friggin' mountain and get to the top. And so I just have to constantly choose with every step between what I want right now and what I want most. So I'm gonna finish. I'm gonna finish. So when I was looking at information on this trail, everyone was talking about how there is this false summit that when you are going up, it looks like you make it to the top. So I am now at that false summit. And I see... I see what I have left to go. Oh, wait till you get a load of this. To be honest, it's not the up that concerns me. It's the part when I want to go back down. Oh, ----. You know, there's a point where I was just... I was really ready to turn back. I didn't have the camera on. I had to put all of my focus into just getting to the top of this mountain. I almost turned back. And I just want to say that this was the perfect first solo summit hike I could have ever imagined because it pushed me right to my limits and then helped me go past. Just the perfect amount. If I talk anymore, I will start crying. So we're not going to do that today. I just need to say that, Canada, you have captured my heart in one hike. So... What else you got? I need to scramble down the mountain and go get my free beer before they close. Thank you so, so much. So I don't know if this is interesting to anyone, but I'll throw some stats up for anyone who cares. You can pause the video and read through it. But this hike is actually only 9.1 miles long out and back, or 14.8 kilometers. It was a little bit longer for me, just going back and forth for the camera tripod. And not including the drone flying time, this took me just under 6 hours to complete. You scared the ---- out of me! Alright.