A Short Hike in Bob Creek Wildland

I have had this moderate hike of Thrift Peak in Bob Creek Wildland near Highway # 22 south of Calgary as a gateway to more challenging ones for two weeks and every time I set my alarm, I didn't have the confidence and courage to get up and do it! This past weekend was the same! The reason for that one was that we had spent a couple of hours in Cowboy's Tap house with The Chef drinking beer and eating junk food, the night before that! So when I woke up in the morning I wasn't feeling really well but I finally got it together and left home at around 10:00!!

It's a major failure for me. In fact in the past 2 years and so all I have experienced has been failure: Getting kicked out of the job, my wife leaving, failing at CFLRS, failing at any job interview I had, failing at the Government of BC job application(s), you name it. I was the one who used to wake up at 05:00 to go hiking and now I have difficulty even leaving home!

Anyways I got myself out of the town after fueling up and getting some junk food breakfast(!) and happily didn't have much problem to get to Bob Creek. There, however, the map was not very useful and as a sign of stupidity I had forgotten to bring the detailed map. I decided to spend a few hours and get myself familiar with the area though. So geared up and hit a trail. The area is very beautiful but similar to most of places in the country is invaded by careless and stupid people who have no respect and regard for environment. I took a trail and after nearly 30 min.I reached Bob Creek. I, stupidly, had two attempts to cross the stream but didn't dare it! I eventually continued on the trail and realized that the peak, which has a fire lookout built on it, is to my left, at west. From there it didn't seem too difficult to reach but it was far. I had to cross the stream and get myself to a ridge and a long ridge walk would 

While I was wandering around the stream, I saw these beautiful birds which were having their bath in the water! I had not this type of bird anywhere before. They sort of camouflaged within the rocks but you can see four of them in this picture. Anyone know what they are? 

take me to the summit. My information had nearly 03:30 hours as the time to reach the summit and it seemed logical: Nearly 1 hour to reach to the ridge or a little more and then the rest to the summit. 

I had wasted around 30 min. on how to cross the stream and lack of confidence, stormy clouds in the area, being by myself and time of the day, all accumulated to make this decision that the hike should be postponed to another time. There are other peaks and hikes available in the area but this peak seems to be the most popular and easiest, something I was looking for. I failed to even start it, though! I hope I can do the hike one day soon.

(Photo: A view of Bob Creek Wildland, it's east side from the trail which goes parallel to the creek. The fire look out could be hardly seen at the top left corner of the photo. It seemed to me the path to the summit would be the ridge of the mountains seen on the center and right of the photo. We'll see in the next attempt)