Tower and Rockbound Lakes

We start our trip toward Castle Junction, the area which offers scenery hike at about 06:00 AM yesterday. It was very brave of The Lady to wake up at that time to accompany. The road, Trans-Canada Highway was extremely easy due to the fact that the majority of the out-goers where loaded and asleep from the previous night's partying!

For minutes I was looking ahead and back, in the rear-view mirror without seeing any vehicle. Lovely! We started from the trail-head, which was founded easily at around 08:15 AM. there were only two cars parked there at the time which we later on learnt that they were not on the trail to Tower and Rockbound Lakes. The trail is fairly easy and wide with no loose rock but starts going up shortly after the start and gets muddy at spots before Tower Lake. The other good thing about it is that it remains in the forest for a quite long time and offers you beautiful wildflowers while you are not exposed to excessive sunlight of July!

The Lady was pacing herself well and didn't show signs of tiredness for the first two hours. We stopped frequently for photographs and sips of water, very briefly. She wanted to get to the destination and I was not tired at all.

You basically go around Castle Mountain on this trip and find yourself behind its beautiful brownish-yellow walls which stand more than 2700 m.! Tower Lake is 45 min. to 1 hour from where you get the first glimpse of Castle Mountain and that is where the muddy road starts. There are streams crossing the trail which are made from the melting snow on the mountain. I tried one of them on the way and I'm still alive! When we were going up Old Goat Glacier I suggested to try some ice cold melting snow water but M. C. said he didn't want to get seek because of a Moose defect in the water of Beaver Fever and I didn't try either but this time I did and it was delicious!

So Tower Lake is there with it's green beauty. The Lady said that she wanted to go all the way to Rockbound so we just quickly took a photo or two and carried on. This last so-called 0.7 Km of the hike exert the same amount you have to burn in the first 7.7 Km(!) It becomes really step and similar to going up high stairs but gives you good view of Tower Lake. You go up and then after a few minutes it's the lake surrounded buy rock walls: Rockbound Lake.

There was nobody there and it was quite and amazing, a little bit windy. We sat for a few minutes of rest and photography. A good extra would be finding a way to go up the rocks and have a nice whole sot of the lake but  The Lady was tired and I didn't want to leave her there but next time I'm in the area to go up Castle, I will take shots of Rockbound from above. 

Rockbound Lake with its waterfall at left. This is not normally how you find it on the web as photographers often post pictures taken from a little higher grounds

We spent a total of one hour at the lake. The last 15 minutes of that we saw someone in the trees right where you get to the lake. It was not obvious what that fucking idiot doing but looked like he was checking on us. That was one of the reasons I didn't want to leave The Lady by herself. I don't know what kind of fool come all the way up and just 5 min. to the lake stops in the woods! I hope he reads this and finds out what as ass he really is. I then went to the other side to get a few other shots and learnt that fool was with a fucking female who was sitting on rocks! What a pair of assholes. We paid no attention to posers and morons and by the time we were leaving another pair appeared and carried out toward the downward trail. 

The Lady was tired so on the way back we took a break and had a sandwich by the streams. As I said I filled up my bottle and drank some glacier water. We saw a few small groups on our way back. Out of them one just turned back after we told them that they were 45 min. away from the lake! By 18:15 we were at the parking lot which is considered a good time. Overall this a very pleasant and nice hike and we had the entire trail to ourselves all the way up, a private hike I would like to call it. I only recommend to start as early as possible. There was no wildlife on the way but two types of Squirrels. When you get to Rockbound make sure to check all around and find different angles to shoot different scenes. If you have energy and time go up the walls and take an aerial shot too. 

(Photo, top: Tower Lake from the trail before getting to Rockbound Lake)