Marriott Basin: Fall colours

Trip Dates: Oct. 8th-10th, 2022

by Line

For the longest time I wanted to go see the larches over Thanksgiving weekend, but with thick smoke still covering much of Northern Washington and Southern BC this year did not seem to be the year. Our friends Ignacio and Pascale and their two kids were planning to head to the Wendy Thompson Hut Sunday night, so we decided to join and I "settled" for some regular, gorgeous fall colours in Marriott Basin. We hiked in Saturday afternoon and as always we had a bit of a late start. F was hiking fast and didn't want to wait for her younger siblings, so we ended up sending Christian and F ahead to set up camp. N was keeping a steady pace, but was as always distracted by the many blueberry bushes - eventhough I thought they were passed their prime. On the way up I was reminiscing about the last time we where there. It was 3.5 years ago with skis, W in my belly and N in my backpack. It sure seemed like an easy hike compared to back then. A couple of hundred meters below the hut, Christian came back down to give N a little boost. 

The tent was set up in the little meadow in front of the cabin with the small river running right passed it. We cooked dinner in the dark on a rock outside the hut, checked out the new massive outhouse and headed off to bed. The next morning I headed off for an alpine hike. I was planning to head up towards Mt Marriott, but on my way to the upper basin I got turn around and started heading towards the ridge west of the basin. Not because I got lost, but because I somehow thought I had memorized the map and just didn't bother to look at it. Eventually I found the hiking pretty lame and decided to look at the map and realized my mistake. It wasn't catastrophic by any means, but I had waste valuable time travelling on some lame loose rock. I decided to head up to the upper lake, take a quick peak over the North ridge and then started heading back down. I decided that I had time for a dip in the lake. It did not feel like fall as the weather was hot and the air slightly smoky, but the lake brought me back to reality and it ended up being a very quick dip. On the way down I spotted a family of ptarmigans, they were well camoflaged, so I didn't see them until I was close enough to hear them. Reunited with my own family I sent Christian off for his shot at Mt. Marriott. 

The girls were playing in a boulder cave they had found, they waded around in the river, and they caught grasshoppers. Eventually they started getting impassioned waiting for their friends, so we read a couple of chapters of Wings of Fire, and soon enough we heard Pascale, Ignacio and their kids approaching. We hadn't been on a trip together for years, but the big kids played like no time had passed. The little kids quickly took to Pascale and was fascinated when she brought out her little water colour set to portray the beautiful fall colours. We hung out in the meadows the rest of the afternoon, cooking, chatting, eating, playing and enjoying ourselves. Christian made it back just before dark after having ​scrambled up Mt. Marriott and a few other peaks/ridges. The kids continued playing as it got dark until a few headlamps ran out of battery and we decided to call it a night

In the morning the sky was beautiful but threading. We had planned on a slow morning, but with the dark skies and no rain gear in our packs we decided to speed to the exit a bit. The hike down has extra fast with a couple of friends along and extra adults to lend a hand. And it was nice for once to make it home for dinner.